PRESS RELEASE

Steelpan Legend  To Be Honored
At Lincoln Center Pan Jazz Concert

New York - June 17^th

On June 20^th, 2004 Emmanuel Jack Riley, steel pan soloist extraordinaire, master pan craftsman and renowned pan tuner will be honored at the Father’s Day show called An Acoustic Revolution - Steel Pan Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall,  for pioneering the art of improvisational jazz playing and contributions to the steelpan art-form....

Mr. Riley, a self-taught musician, is one of the greatest players to ever grace the pan instrument.  At an early age Riley quickly distinguished himself as a player with exceptional improvising skills.   Indeed,  Emmanuel took the art form to new heights with the merger of his American jazz styling and Caribbean roots approach to soloing. 

Mr. Riley is acknowledged as one of the  most influential players on the current generation of steelpan player superstars, which include Len "Boogsie" Sharpe and Robert Greenidge.   Emmanuel Riley, now based in New York, is one of the steelpan instrument's true living legends -  Mr. Riley is one of the best of a special generation of young people who were both great players and master instrument makers.   Mr. Riley's steelpan feats have already been immortalized in song and the folkways of pan...

  As an integral member of the steelband culture and movement, Jack Riley wears at least three hats.  He creates the pan instrument from discarded 55-gallon steel drums - then does the hammering, sinking, physical shaping and molding of the drums into divisions to emit musical notes - all by hand, thereby fashioning the initial instrument into its primary phase.

 Tuning is another subsequent step which requires skill and attention to detail, as exhorting from a steel drum in basically its primordial form, harmonious and melodious sounds  - was not ever the original use intended for the steel container.  Jack as a great improvisational steelpan player and renowned soloist, has the rare distinction of one who may truly be hailed as "Master" of the Steelpan.

CP & TJ

 Click to hear