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Short Biographies of 2008 GCA
Awardees
Edits by Ronald H. Lammy
Hon. L.F.S. BURNHAM
Former President of the Republic of Guyana
Guyana Cultural Association Caribbean Award Honoree
 Carifesta
’72, held in Guyana from August 25 – September 15, was a culmination
of a life imbued in culture. Burnham’s formative years were filled
with anecdotes of his tryst with culture. Growing up in Kitty
village, he was fascinated with the masquerade band, much “to the
chagrin of some of his elders.” In the formal school system, Burnham
showed his prowess in literary subjects. But what really separated
him from his peers was that “he devoted much of his extra-curricular
time to the dramatic club, the debating society and to poetry
reading.” At Queen’s College, he played many characters in plays by
Norman Cameron; he was particularly proud of the part he played in ‘Sabaco’.
His literary aspirations took him all the way to
the top of the Kaieteur Falls in the mid-1940s, when he participated
in a poetry contest and defeated Dan Debidin, only to be vanquished
by Lilian Dewar.
In the 1950s, he was Minister of Education in the
first People’s Progressive Party (PPP) government when there was an
awakening in Guyanese identity and culture. Sometime around that
period, the Burnham Gold Medal for the Arts was initiated (as was
the Cheddi Jagan Gold Medal for Literature); so our leaders were
always cognisant of the value of culture, making efforts for its
promotion and preservation.
This period of cultural awakening was marked by
the establishment of History and Culture Week, which was a kind of
precursor to CARIFESTA and Guyfesta, as the Guyana Festival of Arts
was known.
While he was Councillor and later Mayor of the
City of Georgetown, Burnham enabled the flourishing of a number of
cultural organisations, including the Police Male Voice Choir, the
Maranatha Choir, the Princeville Symphony Orchestra and the
Georgetown Philharmonic Orchestra.
The 1960s saw an additional fillip to culture, in
the creation of The National History and Arts Council in 1965 with
Lynette DeWeever Dolphin at its helm, publishing its first issue of
‘Kaie’ in October of the same year. That body assimilated the
National History and Cultural Council, started in 1963, which in its
turn had incorporated the National History and Culture Committee,
the National Arts Council and the Historical Monuments Committee.
CARIFESTA has its genesis in two important
meetings, now labelled the Caribbean Writers and Artists Conference,
which brought together our custodians of words and creators of
ideas.
In 1966, Burnham invited a number of Caribbean
writers and artists as special guests at Guyana’s Independence
celebrations. Those writers and artists used the opportunity to hold
a one-day conference. Four years later, in 1970, writers and artists
were again invited to Guyana’s Republic celebrations; this time
plans were set in train for them to confer. It was at this meeting
that the idea of a festival of Caribbean arts was firmly entrenched
with a mandate to see its fruition within two years.
Carifesta was born.
Lifetime Achievement Honoree:
A
Gifted Son - Gordon Rohlehr
 On
his retirement from the University of the West Indies, Guyanese-born
literature professor Gordon Rohlehr received many tributes. The
Trinidad Express devoted its editorial page on October 8 2007 to “A
Gifted Son”.
He is acknowledged for “the colossal contributions
he has made to West Indian scholarship, to the intellectual and
cultural traditions of the people of this region… but he was not
simply a cloistered academic. He lent his enormous prestige to a
wide variety of community and cultural causes, never disdaining to
address an audience on almost any subject handed him. In halls and
centres high and low, in gatherings large and small… he would enrich
an audience's understanding of issues related to West Indian society
and politics, art and culture, life and letters.”
“Prof Rohlehr pioneered the academic and the
intellectual study of calypso and the calypsonian, tracing its
history over several centuries, and surveying the enormous material
produced by generations of West Indians from one territory to the
other.”
“He made otherwise unknown connections between the
calypsonians in his native Guyana with those in Trinidad and Tobago,
Grenada and Jamaica, among others. He revealed in more than a few
contexts, the extent to which the calypsonian expressed the soul of
the peoples over the years. He documented the movements from one
genre to another, from one age to the other, from one part of the
region to another.”
“And he kept making those crucial connections,
refusing to romanticise any particular era over another, putting the
same intellectual rigour and the intellectual's penetrating insights
to the soca and the ragga, as he would have done with what he had
described as the bhaji and the mento rhythms.”
“But for so much more than that, his place has
already been assured as one of the region's best and its brightest,
as well as one of its most human and humane of gifted sons.
Absolutely devoid of airs, of professorial perch or of any sense of
superiority, he presided over so many of the pursuits with which he
was associated, with consummate ease and with unusual humility.”
“This is one of the many attributes which endeared
him to the thousands of students who encountered him” in the four
decades on the UWI campuses. Gordon Rohlehr, through his scholarship
and personal example is an exemplar of the best of the distinct West
Indian cultural identity.
SAMMY BAKSH:
Musician
 Sammy Baksh, singer and performer, has
entertained Guyanese for many years. A member of a popular musical
family, Sammy and his sister Dolly Baksh were among the first
“cross-over” artistes in the Caribbean and were popular performers
at the annual Maha Sabha and Leaugue of Colored People Fairs in
Georgetown.
A member of the Indian Merry-Makers Band,
Sammy’s popular song “To Be Lonely” remained on the charts for many
weeks.
Sammy has performed in Suriname, Trinidad &
Tobago, Holland and wth Bob Marley and Third World Band.
TANGERINE CLARKE
Journalist, Cultural Enabler
 Tangerine Clarke, Public Relations Director of
the Guyana Folk Festival and member of the Guyana Cultural
Association New York, has been an active member of the cultural
community in Guyana before migrating to the United States.
Tangerine uses her journalistic skills to
highlight positive aspects of the Caribbean community and has
traveled extensively covering Fashion Week in Jamaica, Barbados, St.
Kitts and Curacau. Her work has been published in most Caribbean
newspapers and on-line publications.
Tangerine is passionate about her work and also
finds time to volunteer at her neighborhood shelter.
REV. DR. EVELYN R. JOHN
Singer, spiritual leader, cultural enabler
 Rev. Dr. Evelyn R. John is the Founder of the
New Life Center of Truth in the Flatbush community and spiritual
leader to this over 700 –member congregation of adults and youth s.
The New Life center of Truth also caters to a
wide cross section of youths through the Youth Group and Sunday
School in the form of guidance, counseling and self development.
Dr. John is one of Guyana’s leading sopranos
and was the first person selected to sing the National Anthem for
Guyana’s first Independence’s celebration.
Dr. John and the members of the New Life Center
of Truth continue to open their doors to Guyanese and Caribbean
cultural organizations for rehearsals and as the venue for numerous
events. They remain supportive of the Guyanese and Caribbean
community in New York.
AVIS JOSEPH
Musicologist
 Educated at the Bishops’ High School
Georgetown, the Royal School of Music, London and the University of
the West Indies, Avis Joseph is an associate of the Royal School of
Music and music teacher and choir director of many Churches in the
New York area. Her subject areas are: music education, violin,
piano, clarinet, steel pan, saxophone, guitar, vocal music,
rudiments and theory of music .
From Guyana to the Bahamas, Bulgaria to
Pyongyang, Havana to London to the United States, Avis has
adjudicated at Calypso, Steel band, Music Festivals and other music
competitions and was host of “Mid Morning Classics” on the Guyana
Broadcasting Corporation. She has performed in the Sound of Music in
Georgetown, My Fair Lady and Boys from Syracuse in Nassau Bahamas,
at Carifesta and at the World Festival of Youths and Students in
Havana Cuba and is currently the organist at Grace Episcopal Church
in Carona.
BILL “Crooner” NEWMAN
Singer, composer
 Bill Newman a.k.a. The Crooner or The Calypso
Crooner has always been drawn to Calypso music and the masters of
the art form. When the Newman family migrated to Canada, Bill was a
young man, and music took a back seat to school and work for a very
long time. It was not until the 1990's that he could find time and
space to return to his first love. Since then he has been making up
for lost time. He chose the stage name The Crooner and released 4
CDs of original calypso music. Reaching into another genre
interest, he has recently recorded a CD of his love songs.
In the last decade Crooner has become quite
popular in the calypso arena gaining success both as a live
performer and in competitions in Canada. He has won several awards,
including Calypso of the Year from the Canadian Reggae Music awards,
and Runner Up in the Canadian Calypso Monarch Competition. In
addition to recording, Crooner has recently extended his live
performing range to stage acting. He is the lead singer with the
band, SHAK SHAK, an acoustic calypso band that specializes in old
time, traditional calypso. Bill ‘The Crooner’ Newman believes that
this music is too precious and beautiful and will not let it wither
and die from neglect.
DR. CICELY RODWAY
Poet, Educator
 To her students Cicely A. Rodway, Ed.D is
teacher: dignified, accomplished, wise, a bearer of knowledge. But
in the very soul of this quiet woman lies a soul that has been
marked by the stripes of experience. The very essence of this
triumphant spirit takes form in the poetry for which she is honored
today.
Cicely Rodway, mother, grandmother, academic,
champion of the workforce, social worker, therapist, uses her poetry
as a surgeon uses a knife. She slices away old scars of past
experiences and, like new skin, the insights revealed find their
meaning in the common threads of life lived in a society marked by
silences.
Her focus on rasion d’etre has permitted a
voice that calls old times to order, examining as she does the
several layers of that which may be called “truth.” The community
that she so closely interrogates in her verse is the subject of her
collection of poetry, Sunstreams and Shadows, Africa World Press,
2002, which is also found in an audio recording. Her second
collection is Women Who Laugh at the Wind, 2007. She is currently
composing a series on the experiences of men.
This scholar reads her acclaimed poetry at
colleges, universities, libraries, academic conferences and other
institutions.
Cicely A. Rodway, Ed.D. exemplifies the spirit
that dares to be brave.
IVOR THOM
Sculptor, Artist
 Ian Ivor Thom, born in Victoria Village on the
East Coast Demerarar had an early love for the military and outdoor
life and joined the Guyana Youth Corps in 1970 where he developed
his talent for carving and painting.
He attended The Burrowes School of Art and
majored in sculpture In 1979, Ivor was awarded a Government of
Guyana scholarship to study art in Cuba at the la Escuela Nacional
de Artes Palasticas. He excelled and was one of five artists tasked
with casting one of the largest monuments in Havana.
In Guyana, Ivor was commissioned to produce a
life size bust of the late President of Guyana, L.F.S. Burnham and
two large mural panels in bronze which is part of the Mausoleum for
President Burnham. He was also commissioned to produce the monument
for the slave leader Damon involved in the slave revolt for freedom.
Ivor Thom is the recipient of the Guyana Medal
of Service national award and his work has received international
recognition. His sculptures have been shown at numerous
exhibitions in Guyana, Cuba and the United States. He has the
distinction of placing his art in private collections around the
world and at the permanent exhibition at the Josip Broz Tito Art
Gallery of Non-Aligned countries in Yugoslavia. This exposure has
made him perhaps one of Guyana’s premier sculptors.
SIR IAN VALZ
Playwright, actor
 Sir Ian Valz, was knighted in 2006 by the order
of Oranje Nassau, Her Majesty, Queen Beatrix of Holland. Ian was
born in Guyana and from a very young age mesmerized audiences with
his stage performances, capturing the attention of Soap Opera fans
who were glued to their radios to listen to his hit serial “House of
Pressure.”
Valz, now adds filmmaker to his resume. He has
reached new heights and his new film Pan Man, set in the Dutch
Caribbean Island of St. Martin, is another of a string of
successful works. Over the years, Ian Valz, produced winning plays
like Masquerade, which was nominated for the Guyana Prize for
literature in 1992. A passage to the Sun, Virgin In Black, The
Peacock Dance, Separate Status, Breaking all the Rules and
Breakfast@Oranje, are examples of his brilliant writing.
Valz has a well established career. He has
ruled the stage of the Guyana Theatre Guild Playhouse, as an actor,
while writing sell-out plays. Two’s A Crowd and Room to Let are two
of his most exciting productions.
A master of his craft Valz has directed over
60 plays and acted in over 30. He held the position of Sports and
Cultural Director in Guyana, and later became the Drama Director at
the Cultural Center in St. Martin, where he created, The Teenage Age
Acting Company, for youth of that country.
Valz, is presently the host and producer of a
thrice a week talk show on PJD2, titled - In the Backyard - a
community service program which offers a voice to everyone who may
want to promote something positive.
LAPARKAN
TRADING INC.
Business,
Cultural Enablers.
In 1983, three young enterprising Guyanese -
John La Rose, Terrence Pariaug and Glen Khan saw a need to reconnect
West Indians who were living overseas with their families and
friends in their respective homelands in the Caribbean and Guyana.
The Caribbean communities in the United States of America, Canada
and the UK needed a reliable channel to send supplies, gifts and
various other items to their families 'back home'. Thus was born
LAPARKAN which is an acronym from the last names of the three
entrepreneurs.
Laparkan opened its first office in Toronto,
Canada in summer of 1983 and offices in Guyana, New York, Miami and
the United Kingdom, Trinidad & Tobago, Jamaica, Barbados, Antigua,
St. Lucia, Grenada, Surinam and St. Vincent, Haiti and the Dominican
Republic soon followed. As Laparkan developed its Caribbean
presence, it simultaneously expanded its North America operations.
Laparkan offices flourished within the communities that they served
and became an integral part of their customer base.
Laparkan’s community sensitivies is
demonstrated by loyal sponsorship of Guyanese and Caribbean
community events in North America. The support has encouraged the
presentation of Caribbean indigenous performing arts by both
emerging and seasoned artistes.
IMPRESSIONS DANCE THEATRE COMPANY
Dance, Youth Development
 Impressions Dance Theatre Inc. was founded by
Verna Walcott-White, President/Artistic Director in 1998. The School
is located in Cambria Heights, Queens, with an average attendance of
40 students, ages 3 – 19 yrs old divided into four levels A to D.
This is a diverse group of children whose
parents originated from: Barbados, Jamaica, Trinidad, Philippines,
Belize, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Antigua, Canada, USA and Guyana.
The classes taught are, Ballet, Pointe, Modern, Jazz, African, Afro
Caribbean, Hip Hop, Praise/Liturgical and Indian Classical Kathak.
They have performed in several Guyanese,
Caribbean and US. Productions and have given back to the communities
time and time again over the past six years The students have shown
their enthusiasm for dance by performing various styles/idioms
taught in a vibrant and fun loving spirit and were invited to
perform at the Guyana Day Celebrations, Guyana Folk Festival’s;
Symposium Gospel Brunch; ‘Freedom Trail’ for the Performing Arts
and Family Fun Day, Back to School/Stay in School Program by the
Labor Day Association Committee, Guyana Catholic Churches Annual
Mass, St Roses Past and Present Tea Party, St John’s Episcopal
Fair, The Guyana Flag Raising Spectacular, Bowling Green in
Manhattan and for the The President of Guyana, The Hon Bharat
Jagdeo, just to name a few.
They have also performed at Waitburg Nursing
Home, in Brooklyn, and St. Theresa of Avilia Church in Queens for
Black History Month Program. Impressions was featured on Queens TV
Channel 35 and Brooklyn TVBCAT on several occasions throughout the
years.
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