Romaya – How Music shaped her Life.
Meet Romaya Sorzano. Pan is Romaya’s life. Her parents are pan players, Joelle Maya Gardiner and Rolando Sorzano. They met through playing pan together, growing up in Ebony Steel Band. Both sides of her family have played/currently play in Ebony!
At the age of 3 her mum began to teach her to play pan (first starting on double tenor) in CSI Steel Orchestra and since then she has not stopped playing. A few years later her mum enrolled her in a musical theatre company where she began to come out of her shell! Romaya was extremely loud and bubbly at home but to the outside world she was very timid, anxious and quiet. Through acting she was able to grow her confidence and speak in public.
Romaya at Steel The Show 2021.
Around the same time, her mum started Ebony Cubs Steel Band, where she played tenor! As the Cubs grew so did her musical knowledge, love for pan, technique and dedication. Throughout her childhood being taught by her mum really pushed her abilities and it paid off. This was really evident in 2012 at the Guinness world record event “1000 pans”, at only 6 years old, Romaya was the youngest player to take part in the record-breaking event. Additionally, at the BAS 2015 Pan Explosion competition, she performed two solo’s on tenor and double tenor, being one of the youngest players at the competition. In 2015, Romaya also played at her first junior panorama with Ebony Juniors Steel Band. Around the same time, she was regularly gigging including performing on 10 Downing Street and at Trafalgar Square for the Mayor. Through gigging weekly from a very young age, she has learnt many beneficial social, musical and communicative skills at an early age.
Throughout primary school, Romaya showed interest in the bass guitar and her mum endorsed her new hobby and bought her one. She joined an ensemble band in the Lyric Theatre. She was also a part of her primary school steel band, and participated in the Steelpan Trust’s Classorama event. At the age of 10, Romaya’s mum bought her first tenor pan, which has grown to be her first choice stageside instrument.
In 2017, she achieved a music scholarship in a secondary school - playing bass guitar! This was a huge accomplishment and this encouraged her to focus on playing the bass guitar and was able to receive free lessons. This led to her joining the school band. The band used sheet music to learn and at that time she had zero music theory, so it definitely encouraged her to want to learn more.
In 2019, Romaya assisted her mum in the creation of their own band, New Generation Steel Orchestra, Romaya was responsible for the naming the band and soon became the captain. They started off with just a few of players but grew rapidly in short time. They did two practices in a week (Wednesday and Friday). Wednesday was dedicated to music theory, and in these classes her mum, Joelle, taught them how to read and write music and essentially introduced them to music theory. Romaya also played in her first UK National Steelband Panorama competition with Mangrove Steel Band. It was her first time playing three pan and Mangrove won the Panorama.
Romana with New Generation Steel Orchestra at Steel The Show 2023.
Unfortunately, in 2019, after moving schools, Romaya suffered quite a bit of bullying. She took to Rap music to express herself and wrote endless songs depicting her pain and frustration. From a very young age, she enjoyed writing poetry and creating raps. He Mum was a rapper and she enjoyed hearing her songs as a child - they always inspired her. So, during her time of depression and battling bullying, Romaya turned to Rap music as a way to express herself.
During this time, she applied to the BRIT School - leading Performing and Creative Arts school in the UK. She was not aware of the BRIT school until one of her mum's friends mentioned it. Once visiting the performing arts school, she knew it was the place for her. She applied, went through the lengthy application process, did multiple tests, an audition and interview and was accepted. She auditioned playing pan and rapping and they absolutely loved it. When she was going through the worst time of her bullying, Covid hit. Although Covid was a worldwide saddening event, for her it was an escape from school. She was able to focus on playing bass guitar and pan at home and was able to write tons of Raps. Fortunately, during quarantine she found out that she was successful to attend the Brit School. She was overwhelmed that she did not have to go back to her toxic school environment, she was relived and proud of herself.
In September 2020, Romaya joined the Brit School in the first year (Year 10), being 1 of 25 students in the music strand. There were over 1000 applicants and she was offered a position, this still remains one of her proudest moments. Through the 2020 -2021 academic year, she did her first live performances rapping. Although, this was a great achievement, it was a very slow year owing to the quarantine effects of Covid. However, she did not let being in quarantine stop her, she partook in many school assemblies online, playing pan and creating compositions of her own.
2021 saw Romaya focus more on her image and social media presence. She considers her look is one of the most important aspects of her life - it’s one of the many things that make her unique. Growing her social media platforms and establishing her artistic presence, invited more people onto her pages- sharing her valuable work to the wider global audience. Although she did not release any of her own music at the time, she was posting pan covers of songs which increased her engagement on social media. She also played her second panorama (again on three pan) but this time with the Ebony Steel Band. Although they did not win, it was such a great year, and the band being on a smaller scale allowed her to challenge her confidence on three pan. She also won the Best student award by Paul Burger (executive at Sony records) which gave her a great insight into the industry and really boosted her confidence in creating and believing in her own music. Romaya creative energy never stops as she also began spoken word/poetry sessions with FLO from the group Floetry which really pushed her writing skills and lyricism.
Romana receiving her Award at Pro Pan Awards
Around this time, she was very heavily invested in her band, New Generation Steel Orchestra. They began gigging very regularly with a few high-end ones. They truly started to establish themselves as a respected steel band. They attended the first BAS/NHC Steel the Show event and completely mesmerised the audience with all of their performances. At that time, New Generation had established two distinct groups, the Junior and the Youth bands.
In Summer of 2022, Romaya had to reapply to The BRIT school, to secure her college placement. She re-auditioned with pan and rapping and kept her place at the BRIT school. She also played her third UK National Steelband Panorama with Mangrove Steel Band playing the three pan. Romaya confessed that 2022 was the hardest year of her life as she suffered many personal issues. This pushed her to focus on seriously writing music. In September of 2022, the new academic year, she made many new friends at college. With the help of her producer friends she was able to create her first song, ‘Intro’ and released the single on the last day of the year. Throughout that winter school term, she performed in the BRIT Obie Theatre and the Hootananny in Brixton. In November 2022, she performed with Cat Burns on the MOBO awards, taking part in the choir. At this award ceremony, she was very happy to have met the likes of Nile Rodgers, Judi Love, Chunkz, Raye, FLO, MNEK and many other great musicians and celebrities. Releasing, ‘Intro’ on the last day of the year meant so much to her. It was not only the Intro to a New Year, but the Intro to a new beginning and essentially the song reflected her journey and how far she had come.
2023, has been one of the best years of her life so far. She accomplished so much and still have so much more coming her way. Romaya is now in her last year of college and focusing on applying to Universities and a few great opportunities coming up. At the start of 2023, In the beginning of 2023, New Generation Steel Orchestra travelled to the South of France to perform and had great exposure to performing abroad. This was a great experience and they are looking forward to exploring more countries. A few days before their France trip, Romaya recorded her second single, ‘On the Come Up’ and released it. Both of her singles are being streamed a lot. They both received over 1000 streams in just one day. Throughout the year she continued to record more songs but have not released them as yet as they will be a part of her EP that she is releasing at the end of 2023.
Romana playing with Mangrove Steel Band at the UK National Steelband Panorama competition in 2022.
Throughout 2023, she performed in lots of venues playing pan, rapping, bass guitar, drums and much more. In the first half of the year she rehearsed ‘Intro’ with a Jazz band and also performed it at a young black creatives event. 2023 Summer saw Romaya play the three pan with Ebony Steel Band for the UK National Steelband Panorama competition which they won. She was honoured to play alongside her younger brother. New Generation Steel Orchestra also participated in the 2023 Steel the Show - The Youth Takeover for the third time and their band continues to grow. Recently, Romaya began to do smaller gigs not only New Generation, but with her family and some by herself. She recently performed in a show in her BRIT college’s Obie theatre and was spotted by a few industry workers and had a few conversations with the executives of Warner music and Atlantic records.
Romaya participated in the Steelpan Trust’s Pan Clash competition and won the 16-24 year old category with her amazing musical deliveries that left the audience begging for more. Romaya has so many great opportunities on the horizon and is just taking each day as it comes.
Romaya at Pan clash 2023 - she won the 16-24 years old competition.
Panpodium salutes this young, talented and diligent musician who did not let any barriers keep her back from achieving what she wants but instead used those barriers to reinforce her thirst to achieve.
