MORGANTOWN — A calypso counterpoint of Caribbean chords filled the Marilla Center Tuesday afternoon as students learned the notes to songs for a concert planned for Friday.
The concert, mostly for parents of the drummers, will be at 11 a.m. at the Marilla Center.
Chanler Bailey said he’s been teaching the classes through Morgantown Board of Parks and Recreation (BOPARC) for a couple years now. He said he’s been making the drums for at least 25 years.
“I have my own studio where I teach people how to play. I have five bands that I run and I love to just share this, and kids are great at it,” said Bailey.
The group included drummers from ages eight to 13. Bailey said he likes introducing kids to the thought process of being part of a team where everyone has a different part, but it all culminates to one song.
“Music is such a completely different language but it’s universal so it’s very important to do that,” he said.
The kids have a week to hammer down their performance. Bailey said he gets a different crew to work with every year. He said they’re hoping to run through three songs — “Superstition” by Stevie Wonder, “Vehicle” by the Ides of March and a calypso song called “Kitty Cat.”
“We’re only on day two, we’ve got three to go,” he said during Tuesday’s practice session.
Steel drums are making a big push in Morgantown in the next week. Bailey said also this week is the Mannette Festival of Steel in which 100 steel drummers from across the world come to play. That concert will be at 2 p.m. Saturday at the Morgantown Farmer’s Market Pavillion.
Bailey was a percussion major in the early 1990s at West Virginia University. The school got its first steel drum set not too long before that.
“I was learning a song on a piece of cardboard layout of the drum. That was like a beginning on a big push of world music so I learned how to play steel drums,” he said.
He got the itch to continue playing the drums around the same time Ellie Mannette, known was “the father of the steel drum”, joined the faculty of the university. Mannette also made the first steel drum and Bailey learned how to make them.
“For me that was it. I was like ‘I’ve got to do this,’” he said.
All the instruments are made by hand, meaning they are all unique. Each voice is different in the drum and they’ve all got their own character, said Bailey.
With these drums, Bailey said he’s confident his students can pull off a concert by Friday.
“It’s gonna happen. It happens every year,” he said.
Bailey also teaches the music component of “Arts in the Park” through BOPARC.
“I love doing this relationship with BOPARC. Involving kids in the city and doing what I love to do, which is spread this art form and get people interested in it,” he said.
Bailey said the Ellie Mannette Memorial Concert will be at 7:30 p.m. Friday July 12 at the Metropolitan Theatre. Mannette died last August.
