KEVON FELMINE
Senior Reporter
kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt
President of the Tassa Association Dr Vijay Ramlal-Rai is disputing claims by Hummingbird Medal recipient Lenny Kumar that the tassa drum is not a T&T invention. He argues that it is more local than the steelpan.
Kumar, founder of NGC Trinidad & Tobago Sweet Tassa, said the tassa originated in India and evolved in T&T. His comment followed calls by Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar for the tassa to be declared a national instrument.
Ramlal-Rai said the Tassa Association has been lobbying for the tassa drum to become a national instrument for about 22 years, and has written letters and met with past ministers of culture and government officials. He said the Association is not at war with anyone over which instrument received national proclamation and believes that both should get recognition.
“I want to tell you very clearly that the Association stands firmly that the steelpan instrument is the first national instrument,” he said.
Ramlal-Rai said the Association provided documents and even engaged the High Commission of India in the past to determine if they could find tassa drums in the country. He said it could not, and the Commission even sent a local tassa band, First Citizens Dragon Boys, to India to share the rudiments of tassa.
“First and foremost, it (tassa) is an instrument made 100 per cent of local materials—100 per cent, including the people playing it. We feel it is also used seven days a week. Every day of the week, tassa instruments are used for births, deaths, celebrations, protests, religious and non-religious,” Ramlal-Rai said.
He explained that a tassa band comprises four players, bass, tassa and brass, and the Association could not find that combination of instruments forming a tassa band in India.
He further argued that when indentured labourers came to T&T, they did not come with a tassa drum but only the memory of it. They eventually found articles, artefacts and materials to recreate the drum. He said the tassa drum is the only instrument they know singularly made here with local materials.
“It is more of a national instrument in its truest formation than any other instrument because I just compared pan with us only because the steel drum was never made in Trinidad. We tuned it into an instrument,” he said.
“It was discarded drums because of slavery, what happened, and we know the history.”
Ramlal-Rai added that the Association wants both tassa and steelpan recognised but with a preference for the latter as Africans came to T&T before Indians. He said there must be recognition of that and that the steelpan is an acoustic instrument that plays melodies like a piano. He said this gives it an advantage over the tassa drum, which plays rhythmic music.