{"id":21178,"date":"2018-07-20T12:24:40","date_gmt":"2018-07-20T16:24:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=21178"},"modified":"2018-07-20T12:24:40","modified_gmt":"2018-07-20T16:24:40","slug":"touch-of-class-set-to-bring-unique-island-sound-to-town-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/touch-of-class-set-to-bring-unique-island-sound-to-town-park\/","title":{"rendered":"Touch of Class set to bring unique island sound to Town Park"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

As they take their unique-shaped instruments from venue to venue, musicians have been astounding listeners with the versatility of their deceptively simple-looking instruments, and this Wednesday you\u2019ll have a chance to listen for yourself as the sounds of steel pan drums fill Town Park.
\nTouch of Class, a GTA-based steel band, are set to take over the Town Park Band Shell on July 25, the latest entry in the 2018 Concerts in the Park Summer Series.
\nSince the second half of the twentieth century, the unique sounds of the steel pan have become synonymous with the Caribbean, but have, over the years, considerably expanded their reach.
\n\u201cI could play a Justin Bieber song, or a Grover Washington piece, a classical piece, or a calypso piece,\u201d says Winston Frederick of Touch of Class. \u201cWe can take the steel pan into every era of music. Languages might be different, but the melodies created can cross borders.\u201d
\nAs far as musical instruments go, the steel pan is a relative newcomer.
\nIts origins are in the islands and Mr. Frederick, a native of Trinidad & Tobago says just about everyone has tried their hand.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s the national instrument,\u201d he explains. \u201cTrinidad is an oil-producing country, so the development of the steel pan [from a drum] was kind of a given and that\u2019s how it started back in the days after the Second World War. It\u2019s an accessible instrument and a poor person can join a group because [the instrument] is available. Your parents might not be able to send you to piano or saxophone lessons, but the steel pan is sort of a free for all. It\u2019s like soccer \u2013 all you need is a ball. It\u2019s accessible to any class of person within the country and that is how we started playing.\u201d
\nMr. Frederick, who is pursuing a Masters Degree at York University with a particular focus on the steel pan, says he and his bandmates just look at the steel pan as just another instrument, but it is an instrument that resonates with audiences of all ages and all cultural backgrounds.
\n \u201cWe\u2019re looking forward to sharing our culture and having a lot of fun,\u201d says Mr. Frederick of next week\u2019s Aurora concert. \u201cWe do a lot of jumping music and, in the summer time, people are looking for a nice night of entertainment, peacefulness, and togetherness \u2013 and that is what we look forward to, too. That excites us when we see crowds of people having fun. That energises us a lot.\u201d
\nConcerts in the Park run at Town Park each Wednesday evening from 7 \u2013 9 p.m. through August. Festivities are preceded by a mini-market offered by the Aurora Farmers\u2019 Market, which begins at 5 p.m. and runs throughout the evening. Admission is free, but donations to the Aurora Food Pantry are welcomed.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As they take their unique-shaped instruments from venue to venue, musicians have been astounding listeners with the versatility of their deceptively simple-looking instruments, and this Wednesday you\u2019ll have a chance to listen for yourself as the sounds of steel pan drums fill Town Park.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-5vA","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-24 21:45:23","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21178"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21178\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}