Seventy-one Years After TASPO, Ellie’s First-Hand Replay
by Les Slater
A When Steel Talks Exclusive
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| TASPO |
Global - This was a 1951 happening, definitely not of the “incidental” or “forgettable” variety – not for the steelpan world, not for the world of music, period. No, nothing of the sort for the experiment known as TASPO, the Trinidad All-Steel Percussion Orchestra (reportedly, Tobagonians had some issues with that name and that no player from Tobago had been selected, and vented their displeasure in lukewarm or non-existent support during the public drive for funds for the TASPO mission). Notwithstanding this, off TASPO went in July of ’51 to the U.K., primarily to appear in the Festival of Britain, the first representative group of Trinidadian panmen to take the steel band message well beyond the island’s shores.
So 60 years later, here’s Ellie Mannette, West Virginia University’s (WVU) resident steelpan guru, lucidly recalling the TASPO saga as if this were a last month occurrence. “It was the opening of the gates for steel band around the world,” Ellie is saying.
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