UK Trini and Friends Steel Orchestra
This is a story of one man’s drive, energy, administrative capacity, and human skills even, to set up a steel band in his local area of Stapleford, Nottingham. His name is Glenn Charles, and he hails from San Juan, Trinidad. Glenn had no connections with steel band culture in Trinidad, apart from a member of his family being on the management committee of the then recently formed Pamberi steel band. But he was a mass maker and a masquerador in his local area. When he arrived in Nottingham, UK, he set up the mass band under the name of ‘UK Trini and Friends.’ It allowed the Trinidad community and the carnival loving Caribbean community and their friends to all get together, to build a more coherent Trinidad presence in Nottingham.
Glen Charles
After years of making some of the best costumes of Nottingham carnivals’ history, he felt that the way to best promote the Caribbean’s culture, would be to set up a steel band to perform alongside the masquerade band. However, he was not a pan player, and had no idea how to get started, but his luck was about to change. When he arrived in the UK, he brought with him a tenor pan he had brought from Pamberi Steel Band. This was his starting point. A single tenor pan.
In 2016, he got a call from a fellow mass band member who informed him that she had seen several steel pans at a charity shop, being put up for sale. They looked as though they were hardly used. He immediately asked her to enquire how much the charity shop wanted for the pans. They were around six individual instruments, no stands, no beaters and extraordinarily little on them to indicate what they were. The charity store did not know their value and asked the enquirer what she was prepared to pay for them. She asked Glenn who was at work on that day, and they agreed to offer the massive fee of £50 for all the instruments. The offer was accepted immediately.
The Lanyard
At home, Glenn soon realised that the instruments did not match. Instead of two perfect sets of double guitar pans, there were two ‘same side’ pans, and the set of triple Cellos, came with only two pans in the set. Nothing matched the expectation. He had to send the pans to London to a pan tuner he knew, Grafton Yearwood, to suggest a solution. Grafton re-tuned the two ‘same side’ pans to create two sets of pans, and he made the missing cello pan to complete the set. Glenn now had two sets of double guitar pans, and a set of cellos. But he wanted a full complement of pans for his new emerging band. A few tenor pans were purchased online to balance the sound of the band.
Glenn met and spoke with Gills Pans, from Trinidad, at an event in Ipswich and they donated a new double guitar pan set to the group.
Glenn consulted a local metal fabricator and enquired about having a set of pan stands made. The fabricator said he would buy the material, but that he needed help to make the stands. Glenn agreed to assist. He spent one evening – every week making pan stands, and at the end, the fabricator sold him the 20 stands for the fee of £25 each. He now had the pans, the sticks, the stands, and the willing ‘helpers at the nest’ that it took to make setting up a steel band possible.
Brent Holder MBE doing workshop.
At the beginning, the band was now a family band, the members; his three children, his wife and himself. To build the band, he needed more pans and stands. He bought a complement of pan sticks from Felix Joseph in London, who loaned him a few old ‘Invaders’ tenor pans. Freddie Hohenkirk gave him a double second pan, along with a set of bases. Raul Gomez – a pan teacher from a London Music Service donated a set of bases to the band. His band was growing. Glenn made connections with Nostalgia steel band, and Brent Holder from London CSI. Nostalgia steel band ran several pan workshops for the now emerging band, UK Trini and Friends Steel Orchestra, and Brent Holder came up from London to run, what I am told, was one of the best pan workshops they have had to date.
Freddie also ran workshops of the full repertoire of Xmas tunes, and Nicola Coker from Pure Steel also lent her support to the new steel band. Soon the band had outgrown its original base, the spare room at Glenn’s home. They had to find new and permanent space for a pan-yard.
Young Players Performing.
A local councillor, John McGrath, who was also a publican, suggested the band moved into a spare room at his pub, The Old Cross Pub, Stapleford. The rent was to be £40 per month. This was quite a huge sum of money for a band that was new and needed to hold onto its members. Glenn negotiated with the proprietor that he was prepared to cut the grass once a month and keep the area (maintenance work) in tip top shape – all this in exchange for the rent. This was accepted and the deal was done. At least once a month, Glenn and Rudy would stick to the agreement, and this ensured the band to stayed at the pub for two years. Sadly, the Covid lockdown came, and they were told to move the instruments to allow the pub to carry out refurbishments. Having put the steelpans in storage, they realised that some of the instruments were ruined in the severe weather when the rain got under the tarpaulin covering the storage area. The band had now lost its permanent base (pan-yard) and is now looking for alternative accommodation.
Playing at an event
Despite the setbacks, the band still has a presence at local events, i.e., local music events, community festivals, i.e., Matlock Music Festival and at carnival events. The group continues its work as a masquerade band at the Nottingham carnival and at other local carnivals. The UK Trini & Friends Steel Orchestra has shown true resilience and determination and continues its job, projecting the Trinidad & Caribbean culture in the East Midlands area.
