Profiles: Heroes, Role Models and Pioneers of Trinidad and Tobago - by Nasser Khan

67 STEPHEN (1921-2014) and ELSIE LEE HEUNG (1925-2006) S tephen Lee Heung, like Edmund Hart, began playing mas with Harold Saldenah in the early 1950s. Together with his wife Elsie Lee Heung they won the Band-of- the-Year title five times (1967, 1975, 1976, 1977, and 1983) including the hat trick and were runners- up 7 times. From 1964 to 1975, Lee Heung’s bands were designed by Carlisle Chang; in 1976 Peter Minshall designed Paradise Lost and in 1977, Tedder Eustace designed Cosmic Aura. Woodbrook, like so many of the bands of today, including Harts, was the base for their popular mas camp. As a young man, Stephen Lee Heung brought out his first band in 1946 from San Juan, Two Ten Carmen, featuring Egyptian costumes. Siam was next and in 1948, Lee Heung’s wife, sisters and female friends introduced women to the streets in The House of Hanoverians. China: the Forbidden City, their first Band of the Year title in 1967 was a spectacular display of the temples, gardens and animal life of China and was the only Carnival band to have been used on a postage stamp.  They won again in 1975 for the portrayal We Kind Ah People, in which Chang celebrated the various cultures of the people of Trinidad and Tobago. The Forbidden City was the first band sent abroad by the government to the Montreal Expo in 1967, and then on to Toronto’s Caribana. We Kind Of People was sent to the Dallas Trade Fair in 1975. Elsie Lee Heung was twice crowned Queen of the Bands, in 1968 winning with Honey of the Polynesians and in 1983 with Diana, Goddess of the Hunt.