Copeland (2)

Liner notes (as written) for Boogsie's new CD, A Tribute To the Mighty Sparrow: Len ”Boogsie” Sharpe on the PHI

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Len “Boogsie” Sharpe has reached a point in his career where accolades are superficial. He is that temperamental genius who can compose in his head without the enhanced skill of an academy-trained musician, the scores for up to eight mini-symphonies for large steelpan orchestras in one short Carnival season. In Trinidad and Tobago, the Caribbean diaspora and the world, "Boogsie" is an icon of steelpan, that self-sufficient and brilliant musician who can do it all. In that sometimes erratic mind of his, “Boogsie” can cajole melodies and improvisations from any steelpan family member, making the familiar new, and the new, unforgettable. His new instrument, the PHI is an evolution of the acoustic steelpan into the digital age, and in the hands of this master, we can bear witness to some firsts.

Sun Ra, in 1956 was the first artist to release a commercial recording of the electric piano (a Wurlitzer) in jazz on his album Angels and Demons at Play. Walter/Wendy Carlos’ 1968 recording Switched on Bachwith a modular synthesizer system, the Moog, heralded the commercial breakthrough for the synthesizer to the general public. These are artists in the midst of transition of the possibilities of sound, silencing the status quo and creating new moulds. Calypso music was first recorded in 1912, some five years before the first jazz recordings in the USA. In Trinidad and the world, as a matter of fact, aside from the 1940 Decca recording of the proto-steelpan side, The West Indian Rhythm Band accompanying calypsonian Roaring Lion, Casablanca Steel Band was the recipient of the honour of being the first recorded steel band with Trinidad Steel Band in 1948. [Brute Force of Antigua would have to wait a further 3 years before they could supply the fiction of their claim of being first.] That recording heralded an effort to put into the public domain, the new sound emanating from the urban yards, those laboratories of sweat and spit and fire, where the steelpan was created and evolved. In the intervening years until now, the steelpan and the steelpan sound have evolved to a rich timbre and wide sonic range that have taken a place in the sound library of World musics with commercial crossover appeal and demand.

The technical evolution and skill of these early pioneers still amazes. To actually play tunes, and yearn to improve the sound and the instrument was heady pioneering stuff much like the work of the Wright Brothers or Thomas Edison. As steelpan researcher Dr. Kim Johnson says, it is “the audacity of the creole imagination!” The importance of capturing that first sound must have also been significant. From a foreign sound engineer’s perspective, this early sound might have been as much as he could perceive the steelpan could do for a while or forever! In 2011, that magic of captured innovation is so important to us as a nation. “Boogsie”, with this CD, A Tribute To the Mighty Sparrow: Len “Boogsie” Sharpe on the PHI, is entering that domain of those pioneers by recording his tribute to the Mighty Sparrow on the PHI. This recording is the first commercial recording using this Caribbean-created technology of the Percussive Harmonic Instrument (PHI), an electronic descendant of the traditional instrument. One pan, many sounds; the complete range of the steelpan family is within reach with a single PHI. Compact. Convenient. Creative. With it, “Boogsie” is an ensemble.

In our existence in the Caribbean, to be a first would need a recognition that comes from creating in a new medium, on a new instrument, for a new audience. “Boogsie”, whose infrequent recorded output as a solo artist exists in contrast to his numerous live arrangements, has now created a legacy project which can only add to the increasing catalogue of steelpan recordings dating all the way back to 1940. It also juxtaposes the creativity of artist and scientist in the Caribbean milieu and highlights how far we have come, and shows the possibilities that Trinidad-born Nobel Literature laureate VS Naipaul never recognized during his sojourn in the West Indies in 1960-61 that he had published in his definitive and seminal travel book, The Middle Passage: “History is built around achievement and creation; and nothing was created in the West Indies.” The steelpan was about 20 years old at the time of Naipaul’s indictment, evolved from its accidental birth and willed into communal acceptance. 50 years later, Trinidadian engineers have created an electronic instrument that merges the powerful facility of MIDI with a form inspired by the traditional steelpan. History will be vindicated!

Sparrow, that great calypsonian whose canon is unsurpassed in terms of range of melodies, lyric topics, and superior performance both on record and on stage, represents the ideal starting point for the evolution of the recording of calypso melodies. One pioneer interpreting another on a pioneering new instrument is a legacy that can’t be denied. It is the evolution of pan. It is the indictment of a version of history. It is the genesis of a new Caribbean musical aesthetic.

© 2011, Nigel A. Campbell. All Rights Reserved.

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July 21 - The “Pan Buzz” to date

Trinidad & Tobago, W.I.

 

THE G-PAN AND PHI...
More questions than answers
 

Panman Patrick getting orn like he eat barbed wire.

 

The controversy involving the G-Pan (Genesis Pan) and the Percussive Harmonic Instrument (PHI) reeks like a nasty fart in an elevator. Everyone is looking at everyone, and no one is saying anything, everybody is behaving dumb as the scent disturbs the nose.  Well I have news for all involved; the Pan Buzz is going to ask questions until I am blue in the face... and who vex lorse.
 

Readers of this column will know that The Buzz has been in the forefront of Pan development.  I have been crying out loud for years for Trinidad & Tobago to take the lead in Pan technology, putting our young, inventive minds to work.  From my perch, and wide and varied network, information reaches me on Pan development worldwide, even as I write.
 

I often castigated governments for not supporting Pan development, so when I heard about the developments taking place at UWI’s (University of the West Indies) engineering department under Professor Brian Copeland, I was so happy.  I started to fart like an old train engine, the one from the Last Train to San Fernando. Now, when I read all the tantana (bacchanal), it makes me sad.  I feel spat upon as this controversy festers like a sorefoot.
 

G-Pans at the launch of the Steelpan Museum, Port of SpainI have already explained why I think the funding for the project (TT $35 million smackers) was shrouded in secrecy.  All the while I was thinking this grand zaffire (old people word) was ketching its tail for funding.  With Pan development raging at UWI, I thought: here was a chance for the inventor of the bore pan, Denzil “Dimes” Fernandes, and the man who invented the Letterpan, to excel - but no such thing happened. They were ignored like a stale cornsoup. Now the mark buss, that the G-Pan and the PHI were the property of Copeland and company (cohorts), man start to run in lawyer office, rather than answer questions.  What makes this really bad is that the Government found out about this because a patent agent was asking for his money. 

 

Now I hearing from the greates’ non-playing panman that ever lived - Panman Patrick (Manning) - “don’t talk to me, talk to my lawyer.”  So who to talk to? Everything happened on Patrick’s watch.  But I have questions for Panman Patrick, Copeland and UWI jefes whose university has been dragged into this mud.  Both ‘Pans’ (G-Pan and PHI) have been registered in several jurisdictions.

Now there is talk that Pans are being sold for as much as TT $15,000.00. 

Now I am not so worried about the G-Pan, it is still a work in progress.

 

Talking about mud.  I am not mud-slinging, I am just asking questions.

Already one of the students who has worked on the project is voicing concern over the deceit of working on both projects as a contribution to the University and the country. It must be galling to know you are making a contribution to a group of men’s pockets.  However, here are some questions plaguing my mind, as I am going crazy:

  • Who controlled the money for the projects?

  • Who was responsible for the oversight of this project?

  • How was the money disbursed:  through the Office of the Prime Minister, or UWI?

  • Did UWI give out this money in tranches?

  • Whose duty was it to check bills of expenditures?

  • How much has been spent so far on the project?

  • Is there an unspent balance, if so, how much?

  • What payments, if any, were made to directors of the project?

  • Will a national awardee hand back his award if found guilty of improprieties?

  • Why are the key players hiding under lawyers, if everything is above board?

  • Are there ghost banking accounts in foreign lands?  After all, these two projects cannot, by any stretch of the imagination, cost TT$35 million

  • Are we playing with a stink bomb, if when fully exploded, several persons will have to run for their raincoats?

 

I intend to talk to students involved in the project, who feel deceived, and intend to mount a legal challenge for their share of the PHI pie; after all, it is their intellectual property too...
 

These are some of the many questions that need to be answered, because what my spies are telling me isn’t sounding too good... no wonder there is a mad rush for lawyers.


_______________

 

Until next week, wherever you are in Pan’s Diaspora, keep loving up The Pan

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