THE TRINIDAD PAN MASTERS

Pictures of my dad,family and friends.

Kim Loy Wong
One of the pioneers of the steelpan movement from its earliest days in the 1940s, Wong was a member of the first teenage steelband in Trinidad, known as the East Side Kids. He worked with other bands until starting the HiLanders in the 1950s.
In 1956, Wong was approached by U.S. folk singer, Peter Seeger, who was interested in the steelpan instrument. Seeger filmed a 15-minute documentary called “Music From Oil Drums” which featured Wong. The film won the “Chris award for excellence in Production, INformation and Education in 1958. An instruction manual was producted in conjunction with the film called, “The Steel Drums of Kim Loy Wong,” co-authored by Wong and Seeger, and may have been the first ever book to document how to make and play the steelpan.
Wong moved to New York in 1959 to become one of the few panmen to introduce steelband music to the United States. Upon arriving, Wong started several steel drum programs for troubled, inner-city youth, including: the Henry Street Settlement; Educational Alliance on South Broadway; Leak & Watts in Yonkers; Dr. White Centre in Brooklyn; Graham School in Yonkers; and Children’s Village. He also taught in Queens, New York. His students there were Andy and Jeff Narell.
During his time in New York, Wong performed with many famous performers, including Richard Prior, Richi Havens and pianist Liberace (which included performances at Madison Square Garden and Carnegie Hall 2 times. He opened for popular acts that included Tanya Tucker and Glen Campbell Ike and Tina Turner, Dionne Warwick, Stan Kenton, The Rolling Stones and John Lennon. He also performed for four first ladies: Eleanor Roosevelt, Jackie Kennedy, Lady Bird Johnson and Rosalyn Carter and the Queen of England . In 1980, Wong moved to San Antonio, Texas and started another steelband with his son Michael Wong called the PanMasters.
Former student, Andy Narell, reflected on his former teacher in a social media post shortly after Wong’s passing. “He was a truly great panman of another era, when tuners were the leaders of their bands, and they arranged and played as well. He gave up his leadership of the Highlanders Steel Band to emigrate to the USA, and in the early sixties when we started playing, he was the man in New York. He was the best tuner in America, and had a working steel band – featuring himself on tenor pan – that recorded and appeared on TV,” Narell said. “He wrote a book on building and tuning pans, and taught steel bands in community centers. He showed me how to hit a grace note and use it for emphasis, a one minute lesson that has served me well. We can thank Pete Seeger for bringing Kim to the U.S. – the first person to take that step. He’d met Kim in Trinidad and made a beautiful film about pan, featuring Kim and the Highlanders. My favorite moment is when Pete tells him he’s so glad to be bringing pans home with him and promises to do right by Trinidad. Kim responds – ‘Instead of taking up the pans, take me up instead. Put me in the box instead of the pans.’ That’s how bad he wanted to go. He was ready to stow away.