This year Simeon “Sanch” Sandiford plans to release several special CDs dedicated to spirituality and introspection, including a new CD by inimitable pianist Felix “Sugar Fingers” Roach, called Felix Roach Plays the Spirituals, as well as Freedom Sounds of Africa, performed by the Signal Hill Choir in the Little Carib Theatre.
The Felix Roach CD will be part of several releases designed to showcase the more meditative, spiritual stream of T&T music, as an antidote to the current brutalities which all too often dominate our newspaper headlines. For there is certainly another side to T&T which is positive, beautiful, and spiritually affirming, and through the medium of music, Sanch and his partners, friends and musical collaborators aim to spread that message of hope.
Among those collaborators is a most humble and interesting small group of people who first met each other as part of their church’s Men’s Group, which formed as the initiative of their former parish priest, Fr Dr Arnold Francis, in 2005 in the Roman Catholic Parish of Bourg Mulatresse. Called the Sons of God Chorus, they are all men in their mature years: their average age is 50. They came together just three years ago for informal spiritual singing in their Catholic tradition.
The group comprises six to eight men from the Roman Catholic parish of Bourg Mulatresse. They belong to the Mary Immaculate Queen of the Universe Roman Catholic Church in Sun Valley, lower Santa Cruz. With collaborations from other choirs in their parish, they aim to release a CD of Marian songs later this year, called I’ll Sing a Hymn to Mary.
“Marian hymns are hymns in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary, mother of Jesus Christ, in our tradition,” explained Walker. “It’s a beautiful collection of music.” The music is a gentle, healing kind of singing designed to ease people’s hurts, as well as celebrate the peaceful power of the old Roman Catholic hymns to and about Mary, said Walker.
“Felix Roach comes to us every Tuesday, and trains and helps us in our singing and harmonising. We want to do a very nice tribute to Mary, the patron saint of the parish church, and hopefully, we can do a recording for our planned CD by August. Mr Simeon Sandiford has undertaken to do the recording,” said Andre Walker, the Sons of God Chorus co-ordinator. Meanwhile, the singing group will make a guest appearance this Saturday afternoon at an Easter Tea and Fashion show event organised by the Barbados Association (One Caribbean Love), at City Hall in Port-of-Spain from 3 pm. Felix Roach will play some excerpts from his Playing the Spirituals CD at the event.
Felix “Sugar Fingers” Roach has been helping the chorus as their pianist and musical director for some time now. He unwittingly helped give the group its name, when some years ago, he observed: “The Son of God became Son of Man, so that sons of men could become sons of God.” One of the singers, Andre Walker, was struck by the saying, and asked: “Felix: speak that again for me.” And so the group of singers found its name.
Felix Roach is a Berklee-trained T&T musician who played piano and collaborated in many musical performances at the Hilton hotel for three decades; he was the hotel’s music director. He received the Hummingbird Gold medal in 2004, and has been steadfastly contributing his musical talents to spiritual enterprises since then. Roach has worked musically with several religious groups, including the Church of the Incarnation in Maloney and the choir at St Jude’s in Arima. He delights in sharing his music for “God’s work”, so this most recent collaboration with the Sons of God Chorus is an extension of his spiritual musical outreach.
The Guardian spoke to one of the Sons of God Chorus members, Andre Walker, last Friday at Sanch Electronix in St Joseph. Walker, who taught himself to play the harmonica and who says he “plays around” with pan and keyboards, is a retired customs officer; the Catholic Church has always been close to his heart. He was previously a member of the Sacred Heart Church Traditional Choir for more than 40 years, with whom he sang Latin church songs; many may recall that choir’s unexpectedly successful 2004 CD Resurrexit, which was a hit in local RC circles.
What first drew Walker into singing religious songs?
“That came directly from home. My mother and my father liked to sing. My father performed in a number of concerts, as a policeman. My mother performed in her school, in dramas and singing. I went to St Mary’s College and I was recruited into the boys’ choir at age 11 or 12. I was the lead treble singer. The musical director was an Irishman who found something worthwhile in my voice, and he used to have me demonstrate to his new recruits how he would like them to sing!” smiled Walker, reminiscing.
“And that’s how my church singing began.”
“I do feel a kind of personal joy when we sing. Singing these songs written by poets is elevating; it has helped my spirituality,” said Walker: “You’re combining the words with the music, and trying to make that live, from the dead letter, through you, as the living being.” It’s like a musical prayer – a celebration of peaceful spirituality through the power of music, a goal which musician Felix Roach also deeply shares.
Walker says Felix Roach hopes to do a piano recital at their newly renovated Bourg Mulatresse church soon, playing excerpts from his CD Spirituals, to help the Sons of God Chorus raise funds for their own CD project. The network of helping hands for these different but related musical projects is born of genuine community feeling.
Simeon Sandiford is the producer, director and recorder for Felix Roach Plays the Spirituals. He recently gave the CD to a colleague of his, Tim Crable, who is a retired distribution manager for the high-end US audio and video electronics firm Esoteric Audio. The CD of religious music struck a chord with Crable, who commented:
“I have played it at least three times, completely through and have enjoyed it more than you might expect. You see, my mother was a pianist and organist for over 50 years. She played accompaniment for college voice classes and a few choral groups around Los Angeles as well as (being an) organist and choir director for the small Episcopal Church in my home town of El Segundo. My father was a self-professed baritone and was a soloist for a different church. They met when she filled in as the accompanist for an all-male chorale group that he had joined just prior to World War II. Throughout my childhood, I heard many of these cuts being sung by my father and played by my mother. Thank you so much ...” (Tim Crable, March 26, 2016)
Roach was among the very first artists to record with Sanch Electronix when it began in the 1990s. He collaborated with several artistes in genres from the spiritual to the secular, including pan-jazz improvisations. But audiophile Sandiford had always dreamed of hearing Felix Roach play as a soloist on a truly outstanding instrument capable of producing “surreal, ethereal, palpable sound”: the 97-key Bosendorfer Imperial Concert Grand Piano. The CD Felix Roach Plays the Spirituals captures Sandiford’s recording of this music on just such an instrument on April 19, 2011 at the National Academy for the Performing Arts in Port-of-Spain.
Sandiford comments:
“The indefatigable Felix ‘Sugar Fingers’ Roach continues to be one of my role models. He is the epitome of fundamental virtues and values that are vanishing at an exponentially alarming rate in today’s modern society – tolerance, modesty, patience, love, respect, dignity, discipline, perseverance, humility and integrity – but most of all, deep appreciation for soothing acoustic music.”
MORE INFO:
Sanch Electronix Ltd Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Sanch.Electronix/
YouTube Amazing Grace excerpt from Felix Roach Plays the Spirituals: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RAEuUSE2PQ&feature=youtu.be