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Carribean - London Based Steel Band Duos and Trios available for events in the UK and Worldwide
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Carribe Steel Band Album |
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A short history of the shiny drum
How discarded oil barrels evolved into a global musical tradition
By David Mangurian, Laventille, Trinidad
There are not many working-class neighborhoods that can claim to have produced an original musical instrument recognized around the world. But Laventille, a hilly, low-income suburb just east of commercial Port of Spain, Trinidad, justly prides itself in being the birthplace of one of the most popular musical instruments created during the 20th century–the steel drum or "pan," as it is more correctly called.
Laventille was settled in the mid-1800s by freed African slaves. There, the African tradition of drumming evolved over the years into rhythm bands of young, often rowdy men, who paraded the streets during Carnival and other celebrations pounding skin drums and, when those were outlawed, hollow bamboo drums. In the mid-1930s, these street bands began to use metal objects like garbage can lids, automobile parts, pots and pans, and biscuit tins because they were louder and stronger than bamboo, and they evolved into all-steel bands, or "steel bands" by the end of the 1930s.
Around 1942 or 1943, according to one legend, a 12-year-old Laventille youth named Winston "Spree" Simon, loaned his large iron "kettledrum" to a friend. When it was returned, his drum had been beaten concave and had lost the "special" tone Simon liked. He started pounding the under surface of the drum back to its original shape and discovered that the pounding created different pitches or notes. He produced a four-note drum and, by this accident, started the transformation of the steel "drum" from a rhythm instrument into a melodic one.
In 1946, according to steel band historian Felix Blake, Simon, using a small oil drum, developed a 14-note pan that caused a sensation when he played it during the first Carnival held in Trinidad after the celebration was banned at the beginning of World War II. The instrument was quickly copied by other musicians, and Trinidad’s rhythm drum bands soon evolved into music bands.
Ellie Mannette, one of Simon’s friends, began using discarded 55-gallon oil drums (the standard for today’s pans), which he hammered concave, trimmed, heated to make the metal stronger and more able to retain notes in tune, and then hammered from the underside to create convex notes on the concave surface. By 1947, he had perfected a drum with two octaves of a diatonic scale.
Pans with chromatic scales were soon developed. In 1951, the Trinidad All Percussion Steel Orchestra (TAPSO), a group of 10 all-star pan men that included both Simon and Mannette, was sent to represent Trinidad at the Festival of Britain in London. The group, which had increased the range of pans by inventing low-note base pans, not only played Caribbean music but classical selections as well. The event put pan on the world map, and the group toured England and France and played on BBC radio and television. TAPSO panman Edric Conner wrote back home: "I don’t want to hear any West Indian say we haven’t got culture."
Today, steel bands have from four to 10 players. Some are orchestras with more than 300 pans spanning five octaves from single "tenor" (soprano) pans of 24 to 27 chromatic notes to sets of nine bass pans of three notes each played by a single person. Steel bands play music from calypso and jazz to the Beatles and Bach. Since most players cannot read music, they memorize their parts, an incredible feat for classical "tunes" such as Rossini’s William Tell Overture or a Bach fugue. Len "Boogsie" Sharpe is considered to be the world’s best pannist, often compared to jazz vibraphone great Milt Jackson. Sharpe can play pan upside down and can harmonize his own melody with a third playing stick.
There are pans tuned in at least 10 different registers–each with its own distinctive "keyboard," or note layout. Some pan manufacturers have steel drums made especially for them from specially formulated steel. A good chromed tenor pan costs upward of $750, and a full orchestra can cost more than $60,000. Most of the large steel band orchestras have corporate sponsors.
Despite the cost, there are today more than 190 steel bands in Trinidad (population 1.1 million), according to Internet listings, and more than 800 steelbands in dozens of other countries, including 300 in the United Kingdom, 240 in the United States and 130 in Switzerland, where 70 percent of the players are women. Pans are now manufactured in at least nine countries besides Trinidad. Steelband orchestras have played concerts in New York’s Carnegie Hall, Washington’s Kennedy Center and London’s Royal Albert Hall. The "First European Steelband Festival" was held in Paris, France, in May 2000. A world conference on the "Science and Technology of Steel pan" was held in Trinidad in October 2000. Scientific American magazine has published an article on steel pan physics.
Pan players worldwide communicate via the Internet. There are dozens of sites from bulletin boards and individual steelband pages to listings of steel bands, tuners and manufacturers by country. Two of the best sites with links to other sites are www.pantrinbago.com and www.seetobago.com. A Swedish site has published a complete manual on how to manufacture and tune a pan (www.musikmuseet.se/pan/tuning/).
Laventille still claims to be the capital of pan. At least 15 steel bands have panyards (courtyard compounds where band members practice and leave their instruments), including the Desperadoes, one of Trinidad’s oldest steel bands and nine-time winner of the Panorama competition held in Port of Spain during each Carnival. When Rudolph "The Hammer" Charles, steel band innovator and longtime leader of the Desperadoes, died in 1985, his funeral rivaled that of Trinidad and Tobago’s first and much-loved prime minister Eric Williams. Laventille has started its own steel band festival in an effort to draw tourists. And several years ago the tops of two huge water tanks atop Picton Hill were painted with silver and pan notes, creating the world’s largest pans.
Notting Hill Carnival 2002 - E: editor@myvillage.co.uk
Deprived of the drums, the Trinidadians turned to the 'Tamboo Bamboo', where each member of the group would carry a length of bamboo and pound it on the ground as the group walked through the streets, producing distinctive rhythmic 'signatures' which identified each gang.
When two gangs met on a march, they would pull out the machetes they had hidden inside the long bamboo poles, which solved none of the violence problems. Soon the government also outlawed the Tamboo Bamboo. Deprived of all traditional rhythmic instruments, the Trinis took any objects they could find, including garbage can lids, old car parts, and empty oil barrels (from the Navy bases on the island). They used these instruments to form the Iron Bands, which marched down the streets playing the same distinctive rhythms. These impromptu parades were called Iron Band.
One day in the late 1930's, during a particularly rough iron band session, somebody discovered that a dented section of barrel head produced a tone. Winston "Spree" Simon is generally credited with being the first person to put a note on a steel drum.
Originally the pans were convex, like a dome rather than a dish. Ellie Manette, a pan-maker still active in the US today, was the first to dish out a pan and give the steel drum its mature form. Many tuners began experimenting with and producing tuned 'pans', eventually forming large groups of the neighborhood panmen into orchestrated bands. The musical competitions, which began to take place each year at Carnival, quickly replaced the street fights. There are two competitions, one for the popular songs of the year, and a separate contest which showcases both the technical ability of each band and the versatility of the steel drum by presenting highly orchestrated classical pieces. Fifty years after the first such contest, the rivalries between steel bands still exist, but manifest themselves in an excellent quality of musicianship.
Different ranges of steel pan:
Lead ("tenor") Pan - highest range, single barrel; traditionally plays the melody in steel band arrangements
Double Tenor Pan - next highest range, comprised of two barrels. May play the melody, or a harmonized version of the melody, or may "strum" chords beneath the melody.
Double Seconds Pan - slightly lower than the Double Tenors, also comprised of two barrels. Often strums chords, but may play melody, harmony or other parts of an arrangement. This is the instrument favored by many solo (unaccompanied) pan artists such as Robert Greenidge and Len "Boogsie" Sharpe (Mangrove's arranger).
Cello pan - usually three or four barrels, set in a semicircle, comprise this instrument. These fill a variety of roles in a steel band, ranging from bass lines, to strums, to the melody.
Quadrophonics - a sister instrument to the 'cello pan; however, rather than having the drums arranged side-by-side in a semicircle, two of the drums are set flat in front of the player, while the two remaining barrels are set vertically.
Bass pan - as the name would indicate, the lowest-ranged instrument in the steel band. Due to the size of the notes used on this instrument, there may be as few as three different pitches on each barrel, requiring the use of six, eight, or even more barrels to complete a single instrument. The traditional role of this instrument is bass lines, but arrangers such as Cliff Alexis, Ray Holman, Robert Greenidge, and Len "Boogsie" Sharpe (among others) will often assign the melody or countermelodies in the bass instruments, at some point in their arrangements.
Steel bands are usually embellished with a rhythm section (known as an "engine room"), including drum set, congas, iron (brake drum), cowbell, and any other percussion instrument which suits the arranger's purpose.
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NOTTING HILL CARNIVAL
Carnival's roots date back to the Abolition of Slavery Act in 1833 when the first Caribbean carnival was held in Trinidad.
Black Caribbeans took to the streets for their own carnival party, with song, dance and costumes.
Over the next century, carnival developed into a strong Caribbean tradition, particularly in Trinidad, where the five disciplines of carnival were established.When the first significant numbers of West Indian immigrants came to the UK in the 1950s, they brought their musical traditions.
But what began with harassment of individual black men by white gangs blew up into a full-scale riot in August 1958 which continued for weeks.
The following year, carnival's first British incarnation took place in St Pancras Town Hall, organised by West Indian Gazette editor Claudia Jones.
For several years it was held in various halls but settled in Notting Hill in 1964, thanks to the vision of local social worker Rhaune Laslett.
As other West Indian immigrants and white locals joined the festivities year on year, carnival grew to its current huge proportions.
It even got the Royal seal of approval when Notting Hill performers began the parade on the Mall which represented the finale of the Queen's Golden Jubilee celebrations.
It still retains a strong Caribbean flavour, with colourful costumes and the pulsing sounds of calypso and soca.
But it now has everything from hip hop, house and salsa to West African drumming, costumed masquerade bands, floats, steel bands, static sound systems, and two enormous live stages.
For many people the Notting Hill Carnival has become a celebration and reflection of London's uniquely multicultural make-up.
Source: BBC London – 24th July 2006
http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/articles/2005/07/25/carnival_steelpan_story_feature.shtml
The story of steelpan Steelpan pioneer Sterling Betancourt remembers how it developed in Trinidad and came to Britain and recalls the first Notting Hill Carnival Each year at the Notting Hill Carnival Sterling Betancourt's Nostalgia steel band walks along the march route, trying to make themselves heard over the noise of the huge sound systems. Mr Betancourt, 74, a pioneer of steelpan music, has performed at every carnival since he was first invited in 1964. Then he and two friends began the marching tradition at Notting Hill that today sees huge crowds squeeze into the area's residential streets. But Nostalgia, the only 'pan around the neck' band in England, has had to modernise as carnival has changed over the years. They have their own float with a bass player, drummer and amplification equipment which the band walk behind playing a mixture of calypso, hymns and old favourites. "The sound systems forced us to get something so people can hear us a bit, " conceded Mr Betancourt. "If you are behind one of the trucks, you can't hear what you are playing because you can't compete with electronic music." It is a far cry from the roots of steelpan music which he saw develop in Trinidad as a young boy. Back in the 1940s, while big demonstrations and carnivals were banned because of the war, a new type of rhythm was developing. The old 'tamboo bamboo' bands of the 1930s gave way to a new sound as musicians started trying new tones on old paint pots known as kettle drums.
"In 1945 at the end of the war everyone went into the streets and picked up dustbins, little paint pans and discarded the bamboo - that is how steelpan originated," said Mr Betancourt.
"There were lots of children with donkey carts, false moustaches and an African drummer with drums made from an elephant's foot"
Sterling Betancourt on the first Carnival
By 1951, Trinidad's new steel bands put forward their best players to join the Trinidad All Steel Percussion Orchestra for the Festival of Britain. The British didn't know what to think when they turned up with drums left rusty for authenticity - one newspaper called them the Dustbin Lid Boys. But once they began to play Blue Danube, the crowd's sniggers turned to surprise. "When we started to play people said 'oh', it's black magic, it's unbelievable - they have a record somewhere, they are miming. It was strange to them that these old oil drums had music to them," recalled Mr Betancourt. The band left after touring Britain and Paris but Mr Betancourt returned with his drum. He hooked up with Russ Henderson and Mervyn Constantine and the new band was a big success across the country in the 50s - playing alongside entertainers such as Frankie Howerd and Spike Milligan. In 1964 social worker Rhaune Laslett approached them to ask if they would play at a small event she was organising in Notting Hill to soothe tensions in the wake of serious race riots. "She asked Russell if we could come and play, she was having a carnival but it was a children's carnival, it wasn't a big thing, " said Mr Betancourt. The three men told friends in The Colerne pub in Earl's Court, a favourite haunt of London's West Indian community, about their performance and they followed them down. "So everybody went down to Ladbroke Grove and we started to play. There were lots of children with donkey carts, false moustaches and an African drummer by the name of Ginger Johnson with drums made from an elephant's foot." "While we were standing there, Russell said 'Let's all take a walk', we call it a road march, and we decided to move off, " said Mr Betancourt. "The crowd got bigger and we got crowds of people coming in with lots of different things - pots and pans, it was just like beginning of carnival in Trinidad." "We passed the church and it had just finished and this woman came up with her purse and she just jumped in the band and started to dance with her purse." They walked down Bayswater Road, making up the route as they went along. But they caused some confusion among onlookers, perhaps because the band was a regular fixture at CND marches which they joined just for fun. "Some people didn't know what it was, they thought it was a demonstration, they said: 'What are you demonstrating about? "Why don't you go back to your own country? They didn't know it was just a carnival, that we were just having fun."
After their successful first appearance, the band returned each year and watched as the event became run as a costumed West Indian carnival. Although Russ Henderson's Steel Band split up in 1976, Mr Betancourt has been back every year as well as travelling Europe to bring steelpan music to new countries. He was a particular hit in Switzerland, where he still has his own youth band, Sterling Angels, who usually come to play at the Notting Hill Carnival. Ebony steelband at Carnival His band, Nostalgia, is a regular carnival fixture and its core ranks of 30 members are swelled to over 100 as players he taught all over the world come to west London for the event. It also plays as a guest band for Panorama on the Saturday night - the competition between steel bands. Although it has been forced to modernise, Nostalgia continues to walk the 4-mile parade route while others drive past on floats. "Now they have the big floats people can't imagine it really started with walking. "I keep that tradition, I think it is beautiful to see people mobile. You can see the expressions on people's faces, everybody smiling - they can see and touch you. When you're on the float it is not intimate." This year they are planning a calypso, 'Trini to the Bone' as well as more traditional favourites. "I usually go for the old musical tunes - people love it, they love to have the tunes that they know." At 74, he still goes back to Trinidad for carnival each year and says he will only stop going to Notting Hill when he is no longer able to. "A lot of people look forward to it and I wouldn't like to disappoint them, it gives me the incentive to go back. "
