{"id":18298,"date":"2012-02-22T09:31:23","date_gmt":"2012-02-22T14:31:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/?p=18298"},"modified":"2012-02-22T09:34:00","modified_gmt":"2012-02-22T14:34:00","slug":"national-arts-festival-should-be-household-name","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/2012\/02\/national-arts-festival-should-be-household-name","title":{"rendered":"National Arts Festival Should Be Household Name"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
DUNDAS TOWN, Abaco, The Bahamas \u2013 Gentry Morris (left) and Basil Been sings a rousing duet version of "The Lord's Prayer", during last year\u2019s E. Clement Bethel National Arts Festival adjudications for the Abaco community, at the Central Abaco Primary School, in Dundas Town. The 2012 E. Clement Bethel National Arts Festival is scheduled to begin adjudications March 5 on New Providence, March 6 on Grand Bahama and then nationwide. (BIS Photo \/ Eric Rose)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

NASSAU, The Bahamas \u2013 Organising Secretary of the E. Clement Bethel National Arts Festival Keva Cartwright said recently that the Festival should be a \u201chousehold name\u201d in The Bahamas because of the range of islands and genres of the performing arts it covers annually.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis Festival is truly a National Festival,\u201d Ms. Cartwright said at the recent announcement of the 53rd annual run of the Festival.\u00a0 \u201cIt is the only festival of its type in the entire country, something that I think we should be so proud of.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Cartwright added that she spoke to a regional cultural stakeholder who was \u201cdumbfounded\u201d at how long the Festival movement has endured.<\/p>\n

She added that the Festival is not just for seasoned artists, but gives opportunities to those new in the Arts.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is to sharpen the skills of young artists,\u201d Ms. Cartwright said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is also nothing for you to play at,\u201d she added, pointing to its national reach.\u00a0 \u201cTo be a national winner is really something big.\u00a0 You can use this on your resume when you go off to college, even at the workplace or on certain jobs.\u00a0 It is a big deal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Cartwright explained that if a singer enters a class, such as gospel singing, they are competing against every singer in the country who enters that heavily contested class.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you win that, you are the best in the nation at that age level,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople believe that everything is happening in New Providence; but some of our best people come from the more remote islands,\u201d Ms. Cartwright added.\u00a0 \u201cIn drama, for instance, Inagua is \u2018off the chain\u2019.\u00a0 Then there are islands like Long Island and the like \u2026 Grand Bahama and New Providence sometime seem like they believe they are the only ones on the map and they are not.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Cartwright said the Festival could average as many as 30,000 entrants per year, is free to the public for viewing during adjudications and is open to adults for entries in the community classes.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope that the day comes when we can bring them all together to New Providence so that we all can see that the rest of the country is there (culturally),\u201d Ms. Cartwright said.\u00a0 \u201cIt is just that they do not have that exposure.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 2012 E. Clement Bethel National Arts Festival is slated to begin adjudications March 5 on New Providence, March 6 on Grand Bahama and then nationwide.<\/p>\n

By ERIC ROSE
\nBy Bahamas Information Services<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The E. Clement Bethel National Arts Festival should be a \u201chousehold name\u201d in The Bahamas because of the range of islands and genres of the performing arts it covers, says the Organising Secretary.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_10223285771444175_51037792744":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[26,104,21,269,59,51],"class_list":["post-18298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lifestyle","tag-arts","tag-culture","tag-educational","tag-festival","tag-islands","tag-youth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18298"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18298\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}