As the first woman to tune for the legendary Panorama competition in Trinidad, Emily Lemmerman has become a pioneer in the steelpan movement. Traditionally, pan builders, known in Trinidad as "tuners," are made up of men, with the concept of female tuners unheard of since the invention of the instrument.
Since learning to play pan in 1994 during her studies at Ithaca College in New York, Lemmerman fell in love with the instrument and led her to seek out Dr. Ellie Mannette, inventor of the modern steel pan. After earning a degree in musical performance in 1998, she moved to Morgantown, W.V to work study steel drum construction with Dr. Mannette at West Virginia University in Morgantown, W.V. She apprenticed and worked with Dr. Mannette until 2004.
Lemmerman now lives in Austin, Texas, where she continues to build and tune steel drums, for a variety of groups. She works professionally as an educator, composer, arranger, clinician and lecturer, and founded the Inside Out Steelband Camp in Austin in 2007.
1. How did you get started as a Pan builder/tuner? Which would you consider your specialty?
My first exposure to the steelpan was as a teenaged performer. At Ithaca College, where I was studying percussion performance, the pan is treated (curricularly) as an important member of the percussion family. During college, my interest led me to Ellie Mannette’s summer workshops in West Virginia, where I met him, as well as many leaders in the steelband art form: Ray Holman, Andy Narell, Jeff Narell, Ken "Professor" Philmore, Robert Greenidge, and other great performers from all over the world. I found it thrilling to discover such a young art form, to be surrounded by such talent and potential. I wanted to immerse myself in it, so after I graduated—without knowing whether I had any talent for building or tuning—I approached Ellie and asked if I could join his apprenticeship program.
I trained with him fulltime for over six years, and pretty quickly also took over running the summer workshops. Those workshops were always my favorite time of year, a microcosm of everything in the art form that is important to me: a celebration of the international steelband community, a center of historical and pedagogical resources, and a venue for new and elevated steelband music.
As a builder and tuner, I don’t consider any particular voice my ‘specialty’. I think the process of tuning is about making choices, and every tuner has a different strategy. I think my strength as a tuner comes from making choices that coax dull instruments to sing, to make weak instruments strong, and my patience and dedication with both those endeavors. I am always happy when I hear that I made an instrument better than when it was new.
As an advocate for the art form, I think my strength lies in my diversity of experience. When I work with a program, I am available as not only as a craftsman, but also as a clinician, a composer, a lecturer, and a performer. Very few people spend much time equally immersed in the separate cultures of this instrument, either in the US or abroad. I straddle these communities, and serve as a conduit between them, both as a technician and an ambassador.
http://www.pan-mag.com/education/qa-emily-lemmerman-pan-builder
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