UNDERGRADUATE PAGE
Calypso on a Dustbin
By J. M. CULHANE (Christ's College, Cambridge) ITHINK the first time I heard a calypso was on the third or fourth day of my stay in Trinidad. There were three or four dusky children—the eldest could not have been more than ten—sitting on the doorstep of one of those wooden houses so common in the tropics. One-of them, I remember, had an empty rum-bottle, which he was rhythmically beating with a tea-spoon. Another was sitting cross-legged before a dustbin-lid lying on the ground. He had two wooden sticks, their ends bound with a strip of rubber cut from an old car- tyre, and, with these primitive instruments, he was drumming. Their combined efforts produced a sound which at first, not unnaturally, seemed extremely discordant. Yet after I had recovered from the initial shock, and scepticism of the possi- bility, I could detect a definite, rather hypnotic, rhythm. After a while they sang to their music a song, which I learned later was a popular calypso of the time : " Brown skin gal, stay home and mind baby.
Brown skin gal, stay home and mind baby.
I'm going away, in a fishing boat.
And if I don't come back, stay home and mind baby."
This most extraordinary form of music, quite unlike any- thing I had ever heard before, seems to be peculiar to Trinidad. Like jazz, it is descended from the rhythms beaten out on tom-toms in the African jungles. Since the abolition of slavery, these native rhythms of the imported slaves became subject to French and Spanish influences as their popularity gradually spread to the entire population of the island, both native and creole. At first the drums were sticks of bamboo—known as bambqo tombon in the island patois—and this continued until the beginning of this century.
It was natural, in a race so primitively musical as the African, for the storyteller to put his words to music; and, derived from slave-gatherings orr the plantations, the cosmopolitan rhythm of Trinidad gave birth to its unique calypso. The calypso tells a story, but is quite incapable of being sung by, to use Sir Alan Herbert's famous words, a girl with one lung, or a man with a voice like a snore. It has a lot of rhythm, but no melody. The music is, by European standards, discordant, but one can feel its hypnotic beat. While listening, one can readily appreciate the primaeval terrors of " darkest Africa." The calypso appeals to far more primitive emotions than, for instance, a Beethoven symphony, though, unlike the beguine of Martinique, it is far from being merely erotic. The calypso is, like the flamenco songs of Andalusia, a racy and delightful account of topics of current interest. It should be extempore, suddenly improvised to com- memorate some occasion, as " We want Ramadin on the ball " celebrated the victory of the West Indies in the second Test at Lord's in 1950. There has, however, been little English influence on the calypso, and the grammar and pronunciation of the lyrics would, to a purist, leave much to be desired; the French construction of the English—if that does not sound too Irish—adds to its piquancy and charm. The words are gay, witty and uninhibited. The atmosphere of the calypso tent, seems, oddly enough, reminiscent of that of a French music- hall.
Even more interesting than the music, however, are the instruments with which it is played. I had heard, of course, of the African tom-tom, but I was certainly not prepared for my first sight of a steel band. There were between twenty and thirty well-built men ranging in colour from white coffee to black, each carrying, by a strap round the back of the neck, the brightly-painted top of an oil-drum. It seemed quite impos- sible for such uncouth instruments to play any recognisable sound, yet they produced- the unmistakable rhythm of the calypso. I think it was during the war, when the import of the more conventional musical instruments was restricted, that it was realised that a dustbin-lid, or half an oil-drum, gave out a note, and that tempering the metal changed the pitch of the note. The potentialities of this were soon realised, and all over the island householders, who had put out their dustbins for empty- ing by the early-morning dustmen, found that the lids had mysteriously vanished. Owners who tried to be clever and chained the lid to the bin lost both.
The method of making a drum is quite simple. A dustbin- lid, or the top of an oil-drum, is cut radially into twelve or thirteen segments; each segment is heated over a coal-pot until the desired note is emitted; then it is plunged into cold water. If necessary this process is repeated, until the metal gives out a note of exactly the right pitch. When each segment has been so tuned, they are welded together again, the whole brightly painted, and there is the drum, having a range of about an octave.
With twenty or thirty such drums, of varying 'shapes and sizes, most of the musical scale can be covered, and the steel band can, if it so wishes, play almost any piece. I once heard a performance of a Grieg concerto, and, while European classical music is obviously not its metier, it played very well indeed.
Both the calypso and the steel band reach their peak at Carnival, the last two days before Lent, when Trinidad appears to English eyes to go mad. For at least two months before, preparations for the two glorious days go on. Calypsonians, as the professional singers are called, sing their latest composi- tions at the " tents," the local equivalent of a music-hall. The calypsonians all have very colourful stage names; Atilla the Hun, Lord Kitchener, Lord Melody, King Harmony are but a few of the number. The bands practise for what seems like the three-hundred-and-twenty-seven days before, working up to a glorious climax. There is, of course, occasional friction between marching bands, and, which is not to be unexpected of a highly emotional and easily excited people, a fight, with its attendant opportunities for hooliganism, sometimes turning into a three- cornered fight with the police sent to quell the disturbance.
It seems a long time since I left that tropical island, but it will be a far longer time before I forget the sight of a steel band, marching in its glory down a Port of Spain street, with its nucleus of thirty to forty musicians, wearing sailor's whites and nightmarish masks, swollen by a crowd of several hundred, all dancing unrestrainedly and without inhibition to this strange music, flamboyant and fascinating.
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