Playing Rhythms on Steel Drums

Playing Rhythms on Steel Drums
I'm Alan Lightner with Expert Village. We're talking about playing steel pans and fitting into various musical ensembles or situations. Different types of musics. Different types of ensembles. The instrument has certain limitations. Volume limitations, we've already talked about, we can't strike this instrument too loud. There are touch issues that are all, there are range constraints, which you have on any instrument, but this only has three octaves. There are a lot of other instruments that have a lot more, a lot wider range than that. So dealing with the constraints that you have on this instrument, how do you make this instrument sing out and have it's own voice and have it be attractive and something pleasant for the listener? One way that we can do that and one thing that I try to encourage my students to do, is to remember that although they're playing a melodic instrument, they are playing a drum. And you have to start thinking like a percussionist, like a drummer and think very rhythmically. So when I'm playing a melody, for instance, if I'm playing, let's see how about Mary Had a Little Lamb. If I'm playing this, if I'm playing that little melody, I'm probably going to think of it more like I'm playing it on a drum, so I'm going to add a little rhythmic flavor to that when I'm playing that. That's a little variation that you could do on any instrument, but it's something very drummerly to play. To add variations but rhythmic variations to thing. Start thinking like a drummer, start thinking like a drummer. You don't have to play a lot of notes when you're playing music. It could be in your solo. If a conga player or a drum set player, or is just a snare drum player, somebody that just has one drum, plays a note, plays a solo that is, excuse me, they've only got that one note, couple of different sounds. They're going to get a lot out of it. You need to start thinking that way on steel pans also. Even though the song has a lot of notes, start. I used three notes and I got a lot out of it just playing with the rhythm. Remember that you're playing a drum. Start thinking about rhythm. Start thinking about playing with rhythms.