Scientific research on pan history

Over the years, several individuals have endeavoured to have documented what they considered to be the authentic history of the birth and development of the steelpan, however with special emphasis on persons and/or steelbands that made impacts on the different aspects of the instruments and other anecdotes of the steelband saga, but unfortunately always with a Port-of-Spain and environs bias, completely excluding almost every contribution from other areas of Trinidad and Tobago.

In 1999, a book titled Panriga authored by this writer, documenting some of the contributions to the said steelband by modest folks from the rural village of Tacarigua was launched.

In that book, I took the opportunity to be the first person venturing to write about the steelband, to make a direct connection of the birth of the steelband to the then outlawed and bastardised Orisha religion which I averred to be the spiritual entity to have spawned the steelband, apparently as a substitute for the Orisha drums which were unceremoniously banned by the then colonial authorities in the early nineteenth century.

During the embryonic period of the steelband, I was fortunate to have lived all my early youthful life next door to an Orisha shrine and palais in Tacarigua, where I became privy to many varied aspects of the Orisha beliefs, music and rituals, which became second nature to me. I had the privilege of interacting with many of the top Orisha practitioners, including the legendary Andrew Beddoe that led me to the conclusion that there is merit in the involvement of the Orisha experience with the birth of the steelband, which swept through the country like wildfire.

I took the opportunity to have that fact documented in my book and I am happy to see that that view is now gaining currency and I must congratulate the University of the West Indies, St Augustine Campus, Centre for the Creative and Festival Arts, which recently staged a play on the subject aptly titled Ogun Iyan As in Pan which sought to concretise and highlight the direct involvement of the Orisha experience during the birth and early development of the steelband here in the early twentieth century.

I firmly believe that it is now incumbent on the National Steelband organisation “Pan Trinbago” to seriously consider conducting more scientific research into that aspect of the history of the steelband and have it officially and properly documented.