Ken “Pro­fes­sor” Philmore took pan by storm.

The self-taught pan­nist fell in love with the sound of the na­tion­al in­stru­ment when he was just sev­en-years-old af­ter dis­cov­er­ing it dur­ing a J’ou­vert com­pe­ti­tion. He was mes­merised by the in­stru­ment.

Philmore even­tu­al­ly got a steel pan from his cousins and start­ed prac­tic­ing for hours a day at his fam­i­ly’s San Fer­nan­do home. The neigh­bours, how­ev­er, be­gan to com­plain about the noise and be­cause of the stig­ma as­so­ci­at­ed with pan­men in those days, Philmore’s fa­ther threw the pan in a near­by canal.

Philmore went in­to the canal, re­cov­ered the pan and con­tin­ued teach­ing him­self the in­stru­ment.

It was dur­ing one of those ses­sions that Steve Achai­ba heard Philmore play­ing the pan and begged his fa­ther to al­low him to come down to the pa­n­yard of the Hat­ters Steel Or­ches­tra. That was how Philmore be­gan his jour­ney with pan, his sis­ter Gail said in a tele­phone in­ter­view yes­ter­day.

Philmore even­tu­al­ly be­came an arranger, com­pos­er and a per­form­ing artiste in pan.

He passed away yes­ter­day at the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal where he had been ward­ed at the in­ten­sive care unit (ICU) fol­low­ing a ve­hic­u­lar ac­ci­dent on Re­pub­lic Day (Sep­tem­ber 24).

“He was a mae­stro and ma­gi­cian with the pan and he will be missed,” Gail said.

She de­scribed her broth­er as a “lov­able, friend­ly and kind” man who com­fort­able speak­ing to any­one, and treat­ed all with re­spect.

Philmore is known for his 1990 arrange­ment of Pan By Storm for Fon­claire Steel Or­ches­tra.

Gail said her broth­er’s dream was to see pan be­ing played all over the world.

As the arranger for New York’s Sonatas Steel Or­ches­tra he led that band to six New York Steel­band Panora­ma ti­tles in the 1980s. He last worked with Sonatas in 2003, re­turn­ing to New York as the arranger for Har­mo­ny Steel Or­ches­tra in 2007.

In T&T, he led the Laven­tille Sound Spe­cial­ists of Laven­tille to vic­to­ries in the 2007 and 2008 Panora­ma medi­um-band cat­e­go­ry.

Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley said Philmore es­tab­lished him­self as “one of the pre­miere names in pan” and an “in­com­pa­ra­ble tal­ent.

“Mr Philmore, a beloved son of south Trinidad, be­gan hon­ing his skills on the na­tion­al in­stru­ment at a very ear­ly age and went on to es­tab­lish him­self as one of the pre­miere names in pan. The self-taught mu­si­cian demon­strat­ed a con­tin­u­ous ded­i­ca­tion to his craft which so­lid­i­fied him as an in­com­pa­ra­ble tal­ent,” Row­ley said.

Row­ley said as the arranger for Fon­claire, Philmore “was re­spon­si­ble for some of the most mem­o­rable Panora­ma mu­sic ever com­posed.

“He al­so found suc­cess on the in­ter­na­tion­al stage with per­for­mances at Carnegie Hall in New York, The Roy­al Al­bert Hall in Lon­don and the Apol­lo The­atre in Harlem. He had the op­por­tu­ni­ty to per­form along­side great en­ter­tain­ers such as our lo­cal Lord Kitch­en­er and with sev­er­al in­ter­na­tion­al acts,” Row­ley said

“It is with pro­found sad­ness that I ex­tend con­do­lences to his fam­i­ly, friends and col­leagues on be­half of the Gov­ern­ment of T&T. Let us con­tin­ue to look at his life as a shin­ing ex­am­ple of pas­sion for ex­cel­lence and na­tion­al ser­vice.”

Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Min­is­ter Stu­art Young said Philmore made an “in­valu­able con­tri­bu­tion to the mu­si­cal land­scape of T&T.”

He said Philmore is wide­ly ac­knowl­edged as pan roy­al­ty in T&T and was ar­guably “one of the top steel­pan soloists in the world.

“Through his mu­sic he did this coun­try proud wher­ev­er he played, bring­ing recog­ni­tion not on­ly to our coun­try but to our beloved na­tion­al in­stru­ment, the steel­pan. He showed us that through ded­i­ca­tion and love for the art form, it was pos­si­ble to be­come one of the best,” said Young.

Young said he be­lieves Philmore’s work with the steel­pan fra­ter­ni­ty will con­tin­ue to de­fine the way the na­tion­al in­stru­ment is played and heard.

Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert de­scribed Philmore as a “pan ge­nius.

“Rest in peace, Pro­fes­sor Philmore. A trag­ic loss. One of the great­est pan­nists that has emerged in T&T. A pan ge­nius. An artiste par ex­tra­or­di­naire. A world-fa­mous in­ter­na­tion­al­ly renowned steel­band icon. I am sure you have an­gels danc­ing al­ready,” Im­bert tweet­ed.

Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment for San Fer­nan­do East Ran­dall Mitchell said Philmore “brought a lev­el of ex­cel­lence to the art­form that can nev­er be du­pli­cat­ed.

“As a child, one name I have al­ways as­so­ci­at­ed with steel­pan in San Fer­nan­do and through­out the na­tion is Ken “Pro­fes­sor” Philmore. He has left an in­deli­ble mark on the steel­band com­mu­ni­ty and our na­tion­al cul­ture,” Mitchell said.

Philmore’s death was mourned through­out the re­gion.

The Grena­da Steel Band As­so­ci­a­tion (GS­BA) said we owe it to Philmore to en­sure that his lega­cy lives on.

“The foot­prints ‘Pro­fes­sor’ left will al­ways be record­ed in our his­to­ry, they will al­ways form part of the lega­cy and times of the glob­al steel pan move­ment and for this, we are eter­nal­ly grate­ful,” the GS­BA stat­ed.

“Ken touched the lives of many with his en­thu­si­asm for mu­sic, his pas­sion for pan and his ex­cite­ment for the stage. Many of our young arrangers in Grena­da have em­braced him as a role mod­el for all the pos­i­tive at­trib­ut­es that he im­part­ed.”

Samuel Roberts, a ra­dio host, and pan play­er in An­tigua and Bar­bu­da, said Philmore “played with a pas­sion that trans­lat­ed to the au­di­ence.”

Philmore used to vis­it An­tigua and Bar­bu­da for the an­nu­al Gemonites Moods of Pan Fes­ti­val.

“The pro­fes­sor was a sin­gu­lar tal­ent, I’m sure that he will be missed not just in T&T but An­tigua and Bar­bu­da where he did work as well,” Roberts said.