3 ms·
A Not-So-Brief History of the United States Navy Steel Band (2011)
- 082349872349872 4y agocf https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAkCj6KJNf8&list=OLAK5uy_mQpov8nCESOgHi2J3fpbdsy8RhVJIiedU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAkCj6KJNf8&list=OLAK5uy_mQp...
- AlbertCory 4y agoThere is (or was) also a US Army Blues Band. I found this recording on Bandcamp, although when I looked again I couldn't find it. They were darn good. https://operationcode.org/podcast https://operationcode.org/podcast (intro & outro music)
- ThinkingGuy 4y agoThe US Army appears to have a number of musical acts: https://www.usarmyband.com/ensembles https://www.usarmyband.com/ensembles I can't find the source at the moment (it's probably behind a Wall Street Journal paywall somewhere), but I recall reading that the US, between all its military's branches, spends more on bands than some of our allies spend on their entire defense budgets.
- AlbertCory 4y agoIt's really a great MOS (military operational specialty), I hear. You can't rehearse all day, so you have lots of time to work on your tennis game.
- mandevil 4y agoThere are more members of US military bands than there are State Department Foreign Service officers- the workaday diplomats who process visa applications, help US citizens abroad, and negotiate things like the International Whaling Commission.
- yborg 4y agoThis is pretty much the last thing I would have expected on HN! I've been playing pan for 10+ years now, and the pans I play were made by Cliff Alexis, who tuned for the US Navy Steel Band in the 1970s.
- tomcam 4y agoHow... How did you get that gig?
- yborg 4y agoThere is a whole constellation of people who attended Northern Illinois University where Cliff taught for many years and who started their steel band program. I believe it's one of the few music programs in the country where you can major in steel pan performance. Because it's a relatively small collection of enthusiasts, buying a pan is still very often a case of knowing a guy, who knows a guy... and individual builders have followings because of the quality of their instruments. I'm sure this is true of many instruments, but you don't have a big industrial producer like Yamaha that sells them. It's mostly individual builders or pans made in Trinidad, which remains the heart of the genre.
- tomcam 4y agoThanks for the fascinating answer. I am a mediocre steel drum player and like learning about these things. I was confused, though, and I thought you were implying you had managed to get a steel drum gig in the Navy.
- Animats 4y agoYes, one of Admiral Daniel V. Gallery's projects. He wrote a number of very funny books, both factual and fiction. He commanded the operation which captured at sea the U-505 German submarine, which today sits in the Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago. (I should have kept those books. Some have impressive resale values on Amazon now.)