How to Play the Lead on Steel Drums

Video Transcript

ALAN MARK LIGHTNER: Hi. I'm Alan Lightner, I'm here with Expert Village, and we're talking about playing the steelpans and fitting into various musical situations or ensembles. We've just talked about fitting into a traditional situation or playing with a steelband where you have a specific part that you stick to that is written specifically for you. There are other situations, I've played with traditional orchestras where you've got everything from the woodwinds to the brass, and the string section and percussion, and what have you; I've also played with that. This A right here is A 440 when it's in tune, and right now it's pretty well in tune, so I can play with any orchestra and I have done that many times actually. And there, occasionally, nowadays, there is musical written specifically for steelpans within an orchestra setting or a classical music setting. Occasionally though, some conductor or producer may want just the sound of the steelpan in their orchestra, and then you may have to play what's written for the vibraphone or the marimba or any mallet percussion. Occasionally, there's nothing written, but they want that sound in there. You may have to take, you as the steelpan player, may have to take your knowledge from playing with the steelband. For instance, playing rhythmic things to join [PLAYING STEEL PANS], rhythmic things, rhythmic and harmonic things to support the melody, and also knowing that sometimes in the steelband [PLAYING STEEL PANS] you will also play melodies, you'll be required to play melodies. Knowing that, you can help your conductor in a classical situation, which I have done in the past, realizing that, sometimes the conductor can give you parts in the supporting range of the orchestra where you'll support the melody, and they can also give you melodies to play. So, you can be playing the first violin part on some section of the song, and in another section of the whole piece, you could be playing support. So, it's good for you to know what the capabilities of your instrument are if you could play both accompaniment and melodic work, and accompany any orchestra in that kind of non-traditional setting.

Community Members who...

• Favorited this Video
• Rated This Video

Thumbs up or Thumbs down? Be the first to rate this video!

Top Tags