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Top: Regional: Caribbean: Trinidad and Tobago: Arts and Entertainment: Music: Steelpan (4)

DescriptionFashioned from oil drums in the 1930s, the steelpan, as it is called in Trinidad where it was invented, was in fact the only musical instrument to have been invented in the twentieth century. In the early 1990s, Prime Minister Patrick Manning declared the steelpan to be the national instrument of Trinidad and Tobago. The presence of steelpan music is ubiquitous and, indeed, global. In Trinidad and Tobago today, large panyards flourish and gigantic national steelpan competitions occur across the country during Carnival season each year, culminating in Panorama. Large steelbands have also performed European classical music in ways that, if anything, improve on the original. (Source: Maximilian C. Forte, 30-09-2001)

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