What Pan Did for Me

Visitors to Port of Spain's legendary carnival will recall Panorama, the steel band competition at which bands – some up to 100 strong – amaze with highly complex arrangements of soca and calypso hits. Rudy Smith is the renaissance man of steel pan artists – by turns a brilliant player, deft arranger, prolific pan-builder and committed ambassador for the pan cause (he spent much of the 60s to the 90s in Scandinavia). He has also been a key figure at the Notting Hill Carnival, arranging for top bands Mangrove and Ebony, and helping to develop a smaller group, Glissando.

What Pan Did for Me charts Smith's musical and cultural development with great flourish. There are cuts from his first forays with Trinidad's Merrymakers, onto his jazz explorations with the Sweden-based Modern Sound Quartet and his own band, The Rudy Smith Quartet, and then back home showcasing his most detailed work. All the tunes selected display his dexterity, tremendous technique and sheer exuberance – pan is an instrument that, just like piano, requires a high level of dedication. The standout tracks are the longer arrangements, which are some of the best pan-fusion ever recorded. ‘Asia’ is a delicate minor key jazz classic, while the live recording of Lord Kitchener's ‘Pan in A Minor’ fizzes with musical intensity. Best of all is the sublime ‘El Vito’, in which Smith's pan playing interacts with Coste Apetrea's Spanish guitar in a truly original encounter.