On April 30th, 2005, the University of Arizona Steel Band in Tucson, Arizona enjoyed the opportunity to perform in Winnipeg, Canada without ever leaving its home at the university. They achieved this through the rapidly developing technology of iChat, computer-based video conferencing that allows synchronous (real-time) activities to take place over the internet.

The University of Arizona Steel Band was the featured steel pan ensemble on a concert as part of an International Virtual Percussion Festival. The band performed the world premiere of “Rub the Buddha” by Jay Rees and arranged by Mike Sammons, Director of the UA Steel Bands. The arrangement featured Robin Horn, Artist-in-Residence at the University of Arizona School of Music and Dance, on drumset as well as Allan Molnar, a New York-based jazz musician and current chair of the Percussive Arts Society’s Music Technology Committee, on vibraphone from Winnipeg. The concert was aired to a live audience both at the University of Arizona in Tucson and Winnipeg. This is the latest in a series of virtual concerts all apart of Allan’s “Accessible Live Internet Video Education (ALIVE)” Project. Other events have included the Brooklyn College Day of Percussion in April 2004, the KoSA Workshop in Vermont in August 2004, and Swedish PAS Days of Percussion, hosted by Anders Åstrand in Stockholm in October 2004. The event in Winnipeg however, was the first time that a steel ensemble has been a participant in these virtual concert events.

Other sessions held at the International Virtual Concert Festival in Winnipeg, were clinics by Terry Silverlight from New York City on studio drumming, Memo Acevedo from New York City and Ruben Alvarez from Chicago on Latin percussion, and Peter Retzlaff from New York City on jazz drumming. The festival continued with Dom Famularo from the Cape Breton Drum Festival, Aldo Mazza from Montreal on drumset and world percussion, Jack Mouse from Chicago on brushes, and Arnie Lang and Brian Wilson from New York on concert percussion. The festival concluded with Allan playing, in Winnipeg, with the Kansas State University Latin Jazz Ensemble, in Manhattan, Kansas.

The concert was met with much enthusiasm from audiences, both in Tucson, Arizona and Winnipeg, as well as the performers, student and professional musicians alike. Although quite different then conventional concerts, it proved to be a successful, rewarding, and educational experience for all involved.

With the continued development of technologies such as iChat, iSight, Internet 2, and future global networks, the possibilities for collaboration between musicians all across the world are infinite. This is good news for the world of pan, as the steel band will have greater access to an ever-widening, global audience. The real beauty of the Virtual Percussion Festival held in Winnipeg last April was not that a steel band participated in a concert fueled by new technology, but that a steel band was brought to a new audience of listeners and musicians in a new and more interactive fashion.

The University of Arizona Steel Band program is dedicated to the preservation and expansion of the steel pan art form. It is comprised of two to three steel bands each semester with the top group, known as UA Steel, performing regularly around the state of Arizona. The band plays many styles of music, several with Caribbean roots of soca, calypso, and reggae as well as classical, contemporary jazz, and fusion. The steel band program was founded in 1987 by Professor Gary Cook and then doctoral student, Jeannine Remy, who is currently on faculty at the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, Trinidad. Born from a small group of personal steel drums, the band now has over 50 instruments and involves students from across the university campus.

In February of 2005, 18 members of the University of Arizona Steel Band program made a trip to Trinidad and Tobago to experience the birthplace of pan, Carnival, and the Panorama Steel Band Competition. Students were immersed in the culture of Trinidad and pan as they visited panyards, museums, pan builders and tuners, and played in Carnival (with Invaders Steel Band). In 2001, 24 members of the UA Steel band made their first trip to Trinidad.

For more information on the technology of iChat and other such technologies as they are continually being developed in this type of setting, visit Allan Molnar’s website: www.percussionstudio.com.   For more information on the University of Arizona Steel Bands, please visit www.uasteel.org .
 

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