Brief history of the steel pan

To understand the history of the steel pan, you have to go back to 1700s when African slaves were brought to the islands of Trinidad.  Many of the people from Africa used animal hide drums for different occasions—religious rituals, celebration, communication, and entertainment.

After slavery was abolished in 1838, the government banned drumming on animal hide drums in 1883 for many reasons including the fear of a rebellion started from communication over drumming and to distance the African people from their religious background so that they could convert them to Christianity.  But the official reason stated to the public was that they outlawed it to prevent any public disturbances.

This didn’t keep the people away from playing music.  They turned to different size of bamboo shoots, they called tamboo bamboo—tamboo is from the French word tambour which means drum.  They used the hollowed out bamboo reeds of varying sizes and struck them on the ground to get different notes, and they used metal objects for their percussion.   Some of the tamboo bamboo bands started to gain some notoriety, but then issues arose where some of the bands became very territorial over the area where they played.  Their actions were similar to gang rivalries and many times the bands got into quarrels in the streets.  They used the bamboo as weapons, which created some very violent and deadly fights.  The government was forced to outlaw these around 1937.

Nothing would deter this culture from playing drums.  They went to only using whatever metal objects they could find—trash cans, oil cans, and parts.  Around the 1920s, they realized that when the metal was bent in certain ways, it created different notes.  After the tamboo bamboo was banned, people began a frenzy of experiments to try and beat out other builders for the best instrument.  Over the next couple decades, some of the biggest improvements were the use of the 50 gallon steel shipping barrels and bend the metal into a convex shape.

It wasn’t until around the late 1940s that the design of most of the steel pans we know today was formed—though improvements are still being made today.  Soon, history started to repeat itself.  Some of the steel bands got into rivalries with each other, starting fights in the streets and using their instruments as weapons.  The government stepped in again, but instead of outlawing the pans, they found an opportunity in the 1951 Festival of Britain.  They thought the steel band would be a great representative for the island.  They created a band—Trinidad All Star Percussion Orchestra (TASPO)—from some of the best players and tuners from each bands.  This band eventually went on to tour worldwide.

In 1963 the Panorama competitions were create to continue to change the rivalries from violence into competitions on a public stage.  Thanks to this competition, many of people involved with the pan were motivated to push the instrument and music further as an art form.  Panorama is still going on today, hosting several bands of varying size from 35 players all the way to bands of 150 players.

Bibliography:

Gaye (n.d.). Steel Pan (Steel Drums) Information, Tips and Advice. Retrieved from

                http://www.steelpan-steeldrums-information.com/

Blake, F.I.R. (1995). The Trinidad and Tobago Steel Pan. Molins de Rei, Spain: Gràfiques 85.

What is a steel pan?

Due to a lack of exposure, many people think that the steel pan is only 1 drum.  This isn't true.  There are many different pans that make up a steel band.  I've created this infographic to give everyone some more knowledge about the different pans.

Hopefully this infographic gave you insight about the different pans in a steel band.

Pan layout images retrieved from:

Blake, F.I.R. (1995). The Trinidad and Tobago Steel Pan. Molins de Rei, Spain: Gràfiques 85.

Welcome

The Caribbean steel pan is an intriguing instrument and the only acoustic instrument invented in the 20^th century, but there are still thousands of people that don’t know much about it or even know it exists.  The steel pan is more commonly known as the steel drum in the US.

The steel pan is an instrument that has been created out of a 50 gallon steel shipping barrel.  They are hammered down to specific shapes to get the desired note ranges for the different types of pans.  To this day, each pan is made by hand and can take hundreds of hours to complete a single pan.

Not a lot of information about the steel pan can be found on the Internet apart from people trying to sell pans or advertise a steel band.  Even though it was invented less than 100 years ago and came from a small island in the Caribbean, it has a rich history, and it’s a shame that more people don’t know about it. For anyone who is interested about the steel pan, this blog will give more information about: 

• What is a steel pan/steel band
• How they are made and maintained
• The history of the pan
• People that have influence the steel pan and its music

My name is Michael S.  As a kid, I was fascinated with the steel pan after the first time I saw it.  I have been playing percussion since I was 11 years old and always wanted to try to find a way to find and learn how to the steel pan.  I got lucky in 2003 when I was at Richland College when the music director there started a steel band program — I couldn’t join fast enough.  From that program, I came to learn some of the pan’s history and how they are made.  I still play today and am in the steel band at North Lake College.

I look forward to this experience, as it will be my first time writing a blog.  I look forward to teaching you more about this fascinating instrument as well as learning some new information myself in the process.  I hope that you enjoy.