Honours for 12 Pan Legends

By Luke Raymond
November 30, 2000
Trinidad Guardian

Twelve men who have contributed massively to the development of the steel-band will be honoured by the Trinidad and Tobago Folk Arts Institute in a Tribute To Legends of Pan.

They are: Clifford Alexis, Wallace Austin, Clive Bardley, Ray Holman, Herman Johnston, Neville Jules, Bertie Marshall, Curtis Pierre, Junior Pouchet, Emmanuel Riley, Earl Rodney and Jit Samaroo.

Les Slater, Chairman of the Folk Arts Institute’s Board of Governors, explained the criteria used. “We set the mid-1970s as the cut-off period for any qualifying individual to have already established himself as a important contributor to the art form. Our intention was to focus on the earlier period of steel-band history, as opposed to the last couple of decades or so, so as to give proper recognition to some key players of that ear who significantly impacted on the steel-band’s growth and development.”

Those selected have made their contributions in the areas of performing, arranging and composing music; instrument design, building and tuning; and teaching or mentoring activity which has markedly helped the global spread of the steel band.

Six live in Trinidad and Tobago : Bradley, Holman, Marshal, Pierre, Rodney and Samaroo. The others – Alexis, Austin, Johnston, Jules, Pouchet and Riley – all live in the United States. The out-of-town winners, are expected to be brought to New York for the weekend activity honouring their work, which will culminate in a gala presentation on April 22 at Brooklyn’s Farragut Manor.

The Folks Arts Institute has organized much activity in the past that has centred on the steel band. Several of the symposia and panel discussions the Institute has conducted since its founding in 1991 have had a pan theme. And the Institute has already honoured a number of individuals who have distinguished themselves in the pan music fields.

The late Lord Kitchener was hounoured for his phenomenal outpouring of music targeted to the steel-band at a gala pan salute in 1992, at which many top pan soloists were featured.

The surviving members of TASPO, the Trinidad All-Steel Percussion Orchestra of 1951, were honoured in a major tribute in November 1993. And Ellie Mannette was given the Institute’s premier award, the Citation of Merit, in March 1993.

The “Legends of Pan” Honorees

Clifford Alexis was a product of the Invaders band in Woodbrook, Port-of-Spain. He migrated to New York in the early 1960s, continuing his steel-band involvement and emerging as a very able builder and tuner in addition to his playing and arranging. In the 1960s he was in the forefront of steel-band activity in New York as a pivotal presence in the BWIA Sunjets band. In the early 1970s his expertise brought him to the Minneapolis, Minnesota, school system, where he spent 12 years as a high school instructor in steel-band music. In 1985 he joined the Music Department of Northern Illinois University, where he continues to share with students his vast knowledge of the steel-band idiom, and in the process has been an invaluable ambassador for the art form.

Wallace Austin became, by the 1960s, a tuner well known in steel-band circles for producing instruments of exceptional tonal quality. His craftsmanship enhanced the sound delivered by such top-tier bands as Trinidad All Stars, Solo Harmonites, Silver Stars, Ebonites, Desperadoes Dixieland and Tokyo. He moved to New York in the 1970s and continued to make his pan-making talent available to both groups and individual players in the New York City area and elsewhere in the US.

Clive Bradley belongs to a select group of gifted conventional musicians who gravitated to the steel-band movement and achieved notable success there as well. A keyboard player and arranger, Bradley showed his mettle by working with a number of calypsonians, including Kitchener, on their albums. He first gained steel-band fame when he signed on as Desperadoes’ arranger in the 1970s, a link that has produced multiple wins for Despers in the Panorama contest. He has done arrangements for several other bands in the Panorama, including Nutones, which also won the title. Much sought after as, in the opinion of many, the consummate steel band arranger Bradley has been a winner in the New York Panorama as well. [MORE]