Bayelsa State, Nigeria - Bayelsa State, Nigeria, home state of Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan - and also the location of one of the largest crude oil and natural gas deposits in Nigeria - has keyed into the country’s steelpan development.
Recently, through the State Tourism Development Agency headed by Mrs. Ebizi Ndiomu Brown, a set of steelpans for fifteen players was purchased. The recipients of these instruments—a group of secondary school students in Bayelsa State—were selected from various schools across the state and put together to form the state junior steel orchestra known as Bayesla Junior Steelpan Orchestra.
The orchestra is currently being trained by the producers of the instruments, Africa Trinidad and Tobago Steelpan Development Company Ltd., (ATTSDC) based in Nigeria.
Already, the band has attended two state government functions where they thrilled the audience with familiar Nigerian tunes.The training goes along with intense rehearsals, as the steel orchestra prepares for its first international outing which will be a steelpan festival/competition organized by “Education Africa” in Johannesburg, South Africa between 1st and 6th August 2013. “Education Africa” had earlier in the year contacted Chief Bowie Sonnei Bowei, CEO of ATTSDC and President of the Nigeria Steelpan Society, to prepare a band from Nigeria to participate at this event in South Africa.
The Bayelsa State Ministry of Education also plans to include Steelpan in the curriculum of schools across Bayelsa State, and to develop as well, a career and entrepreneurship program in the steelpan art form, with the aim of reducing joblessness in the state.
This program promises to train Bayelsa youths as Pan music educators, artists, pan builders, tuners, arrangers, composers, studio engineers, producers and artiste managers with a strong bias for the steelpan.
Original article From when steel Talks.
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