Buy Steel Band Music from Solid Steel	£10 including P&P!

Listen to samples of 'Three' from Solid Steel
1		Sly Mongoose (Traditional)
2		Don't Know Why (Jesse Harris)
3		Coconut Woman (Dennis Farnon/Henri René)
4		Samba de Orfeu (Luiz Bonfá/Antônio Maria)
5		Obeah Wedding (Slinger Francisco)
6		The Breeze And I (Ernesto Lecuona/Al Stillman)
7		Sans Humanité (Traditional)	£10 including P&P!
8		The Way You Look Tonight (Dorothy Fields/Jerome Kern)	PLUS a FREE copy of our previous CD,‘ There’s Pineapple in my Rice! (below)
9		Mango Walk (Traditional)
10		Somewhere Only We Know (Chaplin/Hughes/Rice-Oxley)
11		Ambakaila (Traditional)
12		Three (Paul Cherrie)

Recordings of steel band music are generally of variable quality, but Solid Steel’s latest CD, ‘Three’ thankfully breaks that particular mould with its quality and consistency. Recorded in late 2007, it was conceived as a tribute to the small genre from which it comes and to those that pioneered it. That genre is the all-acoustic three piece steel band or ‘steel trio’ as it is better known.

In the early 50's, newly arrived Trinidadian musician Russ Henderson, along with Sterling Betancourt, Mervyn Constantine, Irwin Clement and the Cherrie brothers, Max and Ralph collectively introduced steel band music to the British in a trio format that would have been unfamiliar even in their homeland. Fifty years on and the genre is still going strong! Dozens of these bands regularly work ‘live’ in the UK and Solid Steel are the brand leaders!

‘Three’ features a mix of traditional Caribbean material and old standards which make up the steel band music that is still popular amongst the players on their gig circuit plus a couple of covers of some recent songs and the self-penned tribute calypso title track.

The band’s line-up features the virtuoso pan playing and vocal talents of British-born Thomas Alleyne (tenor pan, vocals), Dennis Davis (second pan, bass pan, hand percussion), tenor pan) and Paul Cherrie (bass pan, hand percussion, second pan, vocals), playing a ‘live’ set at producer Francis Hylton’s studio, ‘The Barbershop’, in Battersea.
Here’s a little more detail on the main protagonists.

Paul Cherrie

‘When it comes to steel band, mih fav’rite number is three’. So writes Paul on the title track and so it has ever been since, as a teenager in the late seventies, he was smitten with playing calypso music in his father Max’s steel band ‘The Cherry Pickers’.
With a musician for a father and a mother who was a dancer, Paul’s early career as a classroom teacher was perhaps predictably ill-fated, but he remained and remains an enthusiastic educator and a fair number of pan players can claim to have benefited from this over the years.
He founded Solid Steel back in 1986 at a time when the professional steel band music industry was very short of British-born players let alone bandleaders. In this environment he committed himself to hiring only the most promising young musicians irrespective of their status within the steel band community, whilst he honed his vocal talents alongside his skills as a second pan and bass pan player.
He also founded his own management company ‘Tropical Entertainments’ in 1992 and is still busy providing a platform for talented artists of Caribbean heritage to get paid work. ‘Three’ is his concept and shows that at this stage of his career his drive is as energetic as his bass pan grooves!

Dennis Davis

Dennis was born and raised in Notting Hill of Jamaican parents. He started playing the guitar at the age of nine, and was soon playing in youth bands largely populated with pupils at a school where Paul Cherrie taught. Dennis showed a strong interest in steel band music and started rehearsing at Paul’s house and performing with Solid Steel as long ago as 1987. He’s maintained his pan playing over the years and has displayed his talents on tenor, second, guitar and bass pans on numerous domestic steel band gigs and foreign tours with the band.
He’s also pursued his career as a guitarist alongside his pan playing and latterly is in much demand as a bass guitarist on the session circuit. His amazing versatility on this instrument has recently seen him play reggae with the Bob Marley tribute band, ‘Trenchtown Experience’ calypso and soca ‘on the road’ with ‘Pan Necktar’, blues and funk with ‘The Blues Of Cain’, Brazilian music with ‘Made In Brazil’, jazz funk with ‘Express Yourself’ and Afrobeat with Fela Kuti protogé Bukky Leo’s band ‘Black Egypt’!

All these influences are subtly borne out in his inventive pan style which is integral to the sound of ‘Three’.

Tom Alleyne

Encouraged by his Trinidadian father, Ben, Tom started playing tenor pan at the tender age of 7, and promptly joined his first steel band, Pantonic. Since then he’s played and won several major steel band music competitions with steel orchestras such as Mangrove and Ebony in the UK and the legendary Desperadoes in Trinidad. As a soloist and improviser he’s also been recognized in the UK as one of the brightest talents of his generation. Intensely musical, Tom is also a talented singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist and whilst he continues to play with Solid Steel (as he has since 2001) and run steel band classes in schools and workshops in London, his alter ego, D.ablo is forging a burgeoning solo career. He’s very well known on the UK Hip Hop scene as part of the Terra Firma collective and has toured with Lady Sovereign. However, with broad musical tastes in Hip Hop, Jazz, Soul, Reggae and Calypso, he brings an eclectic and modern perspective to his craft that resonates brilliantly in his performances on ‘Three’. Still only 26, he’s a star in the making and is certainly one to watch!

Francis Hylton

Francis' production on 'Three' represents his first experience of recording steel band music, but his association with Solid Steel goes back many years. He began playing steel drums whilst studying sound engineering in Manchester in the early 90's, after meeting up with steel band legend and family friend, Max Cherrie. On his return to London, he soon met Paul Cherrie who began calling him for steel band gigs, on single and double bass pans and also bass guitar (which he also began playing in Manchester.) Over the next few years he worked with many of London's most respected calypsonians whilst also becoming an in-demand session bass player. Francis is also an established writer and producer, as well as making a name for himself as a DJ across Europe. Artists Francis has worked with include Leona Lewis, Peter Gabriel, Estelle, Craig David, Shakira, Mary J Blige, Nelly Furtado, Lady Sovereign, Rodney P, the late Lynden David Hall, the Afro Celt Sound System, The Dhol Foundation and Incognito. Incognito's album "Tales From The Beach" which features two production and co-writes from Francis has been number one on the album chart in Italy and number one on the US jazz chart.

" Never before has such a small steel band line-up released a CD, and after listening to Solid Steel’s beautiful sound, many pan aficionados who would normally only listen to the steel band music of larger bands will join the uninitiated in wondering why."
Dave Yowell (Amazing World Music)

Also available from Solid Steel, ‘There’s Pineapple in my Rice!' Receive this FREE with a purchase of 'Three'!
1	Sans Chemise Ni Pantalon
2	Jamaica Farewell
3	Matilda
4	Mango Walk
5	Cachita
6	Monkey Man
7	Yellow Bird
8	Peanut Vendor
9	Don't Stop The Carnival