Sterling Betancourt

Sterling Betancourt (2016)

Sterling Betancourt , MBE (born March 30, 1930 in Laventille ) is a Trinidadian pioneer and successful musician and instrument maker of the Steel Pan .

Life

Betancourt grew up in Laventille, east of Port of Spain . He was a steel pan builder from the very beginning and played in the steel band Crossfire. In 1950 he became a founding member of the Trinidadian government founded steel band TASPO , who visited Great Britain in 1951 to perform steel pan music at the Festival of Britain . He was the only one of this group to stay in London to form the first steel band combo in England with Russell Henderson and Mervyn Constantine. Appearances in and around London were the result, as well as radio broadcasts and guest appearances in jazz clubs, as Russell Henderson often played the piano. In 1964, the steel band accepted an invitation and played at a street festival in Notting Hill with steel pans hung around their necks. This marked the beginning of the Notting Hill Carnival . As a result, Betancourt played and taught more and more on mainland Europe. During performances in Zurich hotels in the 1970s, he made friends with locals and was the initiator of numerous Swiss steel bands .

Sterling Betancourt has always participated in the Notting Hill Carnival since 1964. He integrates friends from all over Europe into his “Pan around the neck” steel band Nostalgia.

He was awarded the Order of Member of the British Empire in 2002.

swell

• The Steelband Movement: The Forging of a National Art in Trinidad and Tobago. By Stephen Stuempfle. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1995)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ BBC article "The Story of Steelpan". Retrieved June 29, 2015 . 
2. ↑ BBC.co.uk: Marching through carnival's past. Retrieved September 12, 2016 . 
3. ↑ MBE ( Memento of the original from November 20, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.