Global - In an exclusive interview with When Steel Talks, steelpan musician, educationalist, arranger and former music director - NIU Master’s candidate Barry Mannette, shares his overall thoughts on Panorama - its past, present and future...
“....Having traveled and seen how schools in foreign countries treat the instrument, and in many cases have better instruments and facilities to practice, we really need to wake up in Trinidad and put things in place for the school children to have the opportunity to learn and perform at a much higher standard,” Barry Mannette.”
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Barry,This question have been trouble in me for sometime now.I know that every young person who played pan,their dream was to play with Invaders,
In my time it was Shell Invaders,and I knew your father birdie very good.
My question to you is.If birdie was so big in the band Shell Invaders,How come you never played with the band Invaders?
But played with Starlift.
Hi David, I grew up in Invaders panyard and spent many days there with my father, however my first 2 panoramas were with the band when they played Pan in meh system by Ray Holman and Rant and Rave by Kenneth Guppy. When dad was "removed" from the band (for want of a better term) I left too. At that time he was good friends with the then captain of Starlift, now President of Pantrinbago Mr. Diaz and he suggested that I go to him and play with Starlift. I have been with Starlift ever since but I did go back and play with Invaders 3 years ago.
Well Barry,That alright with me.I started out with Invaders and after I went with Statlift.So you cool.David
nice words of wisdom Barry I knew you by face for years and worked briefly with your dad as a matter of fact he is one of the only two men who could get me to go behind a pan in invaders, he invited me and often I declined and when Ray worked with them I did not because of Ray since I was already working with him in Tokoyo, sorry to be going off on your dad but I am glad you mentioned him, his contribution has gone unoticed, I was very fortunate to get an offer from him to learn the ropes of pan making and tuning he knew me better than me, he blocked the yard and I was peeping and they tried to run me and he said let him in and he showed me around and told me I will teach you i refused years later he came over to a project we had in St clair and taught us, the guys in invaders voted him out that year and told me we got rid of birdie and I told them well you also got rid of me, I watched you grow and felt proud of you when I saw you in NIU good luck on your endeavours I am confident that you will deliver the goods and carry on from where your father left off, the pan is getting there as far as standardization slowly but surely, the voices of reason often gets stiff opposition, as far as location of holes these are and should not be an issue in that process as posture can vary, intresting ideas i am teaching my students to be flexible, bases are almost there, tenors are already there, the tuners are now begining to develop an inteluctal understang of the craft, and eventually they will come around, new players will break in and steelbands are gradually growing out of their stubborness,there is hope just keep on keeping on bro it is a slow process
Thanks for the support. I'm glad you can recognise the contribution my dad made. I really hope one day we can get to the stage of complete standardization of the steelpan but as you say its a slow process and a work in progress.
Barry,
standardization of the steelpan should be a priority for Pan Trinbago, I wrote to them years ago about this and I did not get a response...it's such a shame that when you move from one band to another the notes on a guitar or triple guitar often change drastically, same thing with basses, etc.
That is so true, when I played with Renegades and Desperadoes, I realised that they don't use 4th and 5ths tenors, it was a bit of a challenge playing a different pan but I could imagine how difficult it would be for a foreigner. I agree with you and hope that maybe pantrinbago can get tuners to agree on one common standard for all steelpans and make it something official
Thank you very much for the support Mark.