PAN MAN PAT (center) with his steelpan in a Toronto Carnival event at City Hall.
Mimico musician Pan Man Pat is legally blind but that will not keep him from playing his steelpan at the 55th Annual Toronto Caribbean Carnival celebrations that runs from July 28 to August 1.
The festival, better known as Caribana, features Caribbean-style food and entertainment with a famed Grand Parade hitting the streets on August 1 with dozens of bands and costumed-dancers shaking their booty down Lakeshore Boulevard near the Royal Canadian Legion Hall, at Ontario Place.
CARNIVAL MAS Players have fun dancing along Lakeshore Blvd. Photos courtesy of Toronto Carnival.
More than one million people are expected to visit Toronto and area for the musical lakefront party, with thousands of spectators arriving from the U.S. Nearly all hotel rooms in the area are booked.
Pan Man Pat, whose name is Pat McNeilly, is a legendary steel pan player and Etobicoke high school instructor who has been involved in the city’s steelpan and carnival culture from the beginning.
He will join other musicians and bands playing calypso, reggae, some merengue and other hits on the parade route.
“I have never missed performing in a Caribana in Toronto,” Pan Man Pat says. “This is my 55th year of playing the steel pans here and it is still a great festival.”
Revellers of all ages and races are expected to return in force for the massive street party, which was postponed for two years due to the virus.
The Caribana festival was gifted to Canada by the Caribbean Community as part of Canada’s centennial celebrations in 1967.
HAVING FUN with her bandmembers at the Grand Parade. Photo courtesy of Toronto Carnival.
This Caribbean tradition of parading through the streets was taken from the Trinidad and Tobago carnival in celebration of freedom and emancipation from slavery in the West Indies.
The native of Trinidad, Pan Man Pat arrived in Canada in 1966 and has always been involved in playing the steel pan and teaching students to play the instrument at a number of schools in Etobicoke.
“There are now 50 sites where the steel band is now taught,” he says proudly. “The steel pan is also a degree course offered at York University.”
Pan Man Pat has had a long and varied career, which included four-years protecting the public as a constable with the Toronto Police Service (TPS). He was also a private eye for a law firm founded by the late civil rights lawyer Charles Roach.
MORE THAN 1 million people are expected for the Carnival’s 55th Anniversary.
FORMER Toronto Police Constable Pat McNeilly aka Pan Man Pat. Courtesy photo.
“I was also a member of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters in the 1960s,” he boasts. “I went from sleeping cars to being a teacher and playing the steel pan.”
He hosted a successful online steel pan and calypso music program during the COVID lockdown that had gained a huge following.
This is his busy season and Pat is playing gigs a couple times a week.
Other activities taking place during the Toronto Carnival weekend includes: a carnival king and queen costume extravaganza on July 28 at Lamport Stadium., at 1151 King Street W. There is also a Pan Alive sounds of steel pan Showcase on July 29 with live performances, dances and food. For more information or to book tickets visit torontocarnival.ca