A Woman of Gold - Mrs Franka Hills-Headley - Reboot

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A Woman of Gold

Mrs Franka Hills-Headley

By Dr Jeannine 'J9' Remy, lecturer in music, CCFA, UWI

A When Steel Talks Exclusive


Mrs Franka Hills-Headley


 How did it start?

About 10 years ago, the idea of creating a pan school came out of a mother's concern for the direction pan was taking with the youths; where at that time, there was still that lingering negative stigma attached to the major panyards. When people began to see how she was teaching her daughter Vanessa how to play pan, other parents approached her for giving lessons ...hence the birth of Golden Hands. What began as a mother's dream of teaching her five year old daughter, has now turned into a fully-fledged 65+ membered pan school.

This mother has a lot to be pleased about this year (see list 2). Not only with her Golden Hands venture, but it seems that the early start with her daughter bears golden apples as well. Vanessa, now 17, won the soloist category for the Junior Steelband Music Festival in November 2005; arranged (Destras / Mark Loquan's) Colours Again for Junior Panorama 2006, which took Golden Hands to 3rd place; and her music composition entitled Us, that she submitted for her Caribbean Examination Council (CXC) music course last year, this year brought the astonishing news that she had earned first place in the entire Caribbean.

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