Grayson Enterprises Ltd. One time rights Exc!usive to your county Page 1 Approximate!y 1,300 words ROLL OUT THE BARRELS THE STEEL DRUM BAND IS COMING TO TOWN CLIFF ALEXIS - STEEL DRUM BAND TUNER Written by June Grayson - Photographed by Richard Grayson Meet C!iff A!exis, American Revo!utionary. His weapons? A s!edge hammer, assorted ma!!ets, and a strobe tuner. His goa!? To make the wor!d safe for stee! drum bands. Actua!!y, A!exis is an instrument tuner at Northern I!linois University and his goal is the promotion of the stee! drum, which began and f!ourished in spite of po!itica! opposition in Trinidad. He doesn't sound !ike a .revo!utionary. His speaking voice is barely audib!e, with a trace of a Britsh accent because he is a native of Trinidad which is part of the British Commonwea!th. His command post is a sma!! room behind a !ocker area on the second floor of the music #ui|ding at NIU. One north window and cold f!uorescent !ights revea! the painted concrete b!ock wa!!s, bare except for smudged schematic drawings and scribb!ed handwritten notes. . #EL, STB, #age 2 It is here he makes the steel drums ordered by percussion- ists throughout the United States. The stee! drum is the on!y new, non-e1ectronic instrument the 20th century has produced. A!exis was present a!most at the creation. To understand why stee! drum pioneers consider themse!ves revolutionaries, you have to understand the co1onialism out of which the stee! drum evo!ved in Trinidad. Trinidad and its sister is!and, Tobago, are the southernmost islands of the Caribbean, just seven mi!es off the coast of South America. A!though Trinidad today boasts of a cosmopo!itan and har- monious ethnic b!end of peoples, it had its growing pains a!ong the way. Discovered by Co!umbus on his third American voyage in 1498, Trinidad was occupied by the Spanish during their search for go!d in the new wor!d and then conquered by the British in 1797. B!ack African s!aves supp!ied the !abor for its burgeoning economy. When slavery was abolished in 1834, tho British encoura#ed East lndians to emi#rate to Trinidad as indentured servants to solve the !abor shortaqe. The Africans and Indians shared a !ove for the drum and the rhytmic sounds it produced. To the white European governing c!ass, the sound of the drum was a constant threat, so officia!s banned the African drum, hoping to stamp out quasi-re|igious cu!ts. But the underc!ass wou!d not be stopped, deve!oping the . GEL, SDB, page 3 Tambour-bamboo bands to provide rhythmic accompaniment for festiva! processions. These "stick-bands" used different lengths and thicknesses of bamboo which produced varied pitches when the sticks were "knocked" against the pavement. Would you want throngs of peop!e marching around your town with musical sticks which cou!d doub!e as dead!y weapons? Predictab!y, neither did the colonial governors who banned the Tambourbamboo bands in 1937. But native ingenuity conquered again! Reve!ers grabbed any- thing metal - parts of old cars and empty tin cans - to bang on for their road marches. Peop!e noticed that dented p!aces in the meta! produced varied pitches when struck in succession. The next step was to dent the metal purpose!y to play simp!e me!odies. E!!ie Manette of Trinidad is credited with being the first person to use a 55 gallon oil drum, pushing the top of the drum down into a concave shape so that he cou!d arrange different notes in a chromatic sca!e. C!iff Alexis was a member of one of Manette's first bands, the Invaders. But association with the stee! drum band crowd was frowned upon by parents in Trinidad in the 1940s and 1950s. His fami!y and the Catho!ic nuns at his schoo! warned him to stay away from the stee! drums. But they were asking too much of Alexis. #From the time when I first heard the stee! drum when I was eight years old, I have never wanted to do anything but p!ay that drum! . #EL, SDB, page 4 "I was fascinated that you could take a discarded oil barre! .__ and turn it into a beautiful instrument. The rhythm was there, of course, but the sound - that was something tota!!y new!" In spite of its humb!e origin, steel drum band fever swept Trinidad, unti! it was proc!aimed Trinidad's nationa! instrument #n the 1960s. A!exis's interest in the steel drum continued. He ditched his classes whenever he cou!d and refused to !earn anything but how to p!ay the stee! drum. Eventua!ly his focus paid off. A!exis became one of the 44 memb#rs of Trin!dad's Nationa! Steel Drum Band when he was in his 20s. The band gave concerts in #ondon and Dakar, AFrica, and toured the United States. A!exis decided that he wou!d have to move to the United States to gain personal success with the stee! drum. He formed his own trave!ing stee! drum band which performed in Las Vegas and Reno as we!l as with the Liberace show. After his marriage and his three chi!dren were born, A!exis decided it was time to sett!e dow#. He became a stee! drum band St..pau##Central High Schoo! in M!nnesota. He moved to NIU in 1985. Perhaps acoustica! studies wi!! some day define precise!y how the harmonics of the stee| drum are produced so that they can be manufactured in quantity. In fact, such research is now underway at NIU. But for now, each drum must be made by hand one at a time. #EL, SDB, page 5 The fina! qua!ity of a drum depends on the abi!ity of the craftsman who makes it, stict!y with ski!!s learned on-the-job. Trinidadian pan tuners still are reputed.to produce the best drums, and A!exis is considered one of the best in the fie1d. A!exis describes his work as "tota11y imprecise". He begin# by scouting loca! oi! companies for used barre!s, which cost about $6 apiece. Generally, a 55-gal!on oil barre! of 18-gauge thickness which is not too rusty will make the proper sound. The 49-year old A!exis uses a s!edgehammer to sink in the He next builds a sma!l bonfire right in front of NIU's music building. Like a #ood cook who knows instinctively when a dish is ready, he heats the drum just until the paint burns Off. Oil barrels are most uncooperative. "They break and sp!it as often as possible. Then I go get crazy angry. I have to throw them away and start a!! over." He chisels in the grooves that divide the circ!e into segments: arranging different notes according to his schematic drawings. The size and thickness of the stee! determine the pitch of each separate segment. The greater the concavity, the thinner the stee! becomes and the higher the pitch of the notes. The bass drums have room for the fewest notes and the soprano drums have the most notes. A!exis also makes the ma!!ets with which the drums are p!ayed, using assorted sizes of wooden dowe!s and rubber ba!!s which he buys at the dime store for the tips. Working eight to twe!ve hours a day alone in his room, A!exis may take three days to make one drum, which se!!s for $650 to $750. A band of 20 to 100 drums represents a considerab!e investment ' for a school. It also represents a considerab!e investment for A!exis. His work is slow and solitary. Now that he is divorced and his children grown, he devotes his life to the promotion of the steel drum. His foot goes to sleep when he stands too long at his work. This is a concern for A!exis because he takesn insu!in twice a day and worries about diabetic comp!ications. When the drums are finished and assemb!ed upon their stands, a11 of the effort seems worthwhi!e. Though A!exis is reserved when speaking, he is transformed when he p!ays the stee! drum. He Iets his music speak for him. This year at NIU, in addition to his work as an instrument tuner, A!exis directs the stee! drum band. These percussion students practice four days a week and are avai!ab!e for outside engagements. In fact, if A!exis has his way, I!!inois may soon have more stee! drum bands than Trinidad. Less than 15 col!eges in the United States have steel drum bands and five of them are in I!!inois: NIU at DeKa!b, Western Illinois University at Macomb, University of .lllinois at Urbana, Waubonsee Community Co!!ege at Sugar Grove, and the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago. A!exis created many of their instruments. C!emente High Schoo! in Chicago has had its own steel drum band since 1967. Its students may e!ect to fu!fi! their one year music requirement by studying the stee! drum and about 50 a year do just that. The advanced students p!ay together for community appearances. GEL, SDB, page 7 .-- Stee! drum band concerts such as the pre-Lenten PANORAMA are a big tourist attraction in Trinidad. If you can't travel to Trinidad, check out the concert schedu!e of the stee! drum band at the. school nearest you. Listen to a Bil!y Ocean recording and hear the steel drum in the background. Visit the Wa!t Disney Wor!d Magic _King#om in F!orida which has featured stee! drum band entertain- ment for the past twe!ve years. Wherever you are privi!eged to hear the begui!ing music of the stee! drum, just remember that each drum is the work of one gifted pan tuner such as Cliff A|exis. #####