Future Home Page for Joseph "Panhead" Peck's Artist Webpage. In the meantime, listen to tracks below that Joseph has recorded. I once was asked, “What is something you are passionate about and why?”. Well, as a young child my mother often found me banging out rhythms on her pots and pans with a pair of wooden spoons. Not too long after I began walking my parents bought me one of those paper head drum sets out of the Sears Catalog. Over the next four to five years I tore through multiple “toy” drumset until I received my first real Rogers Snare Drum at the age of seven. These early experiences in Cleveland, Ohio with rhythm and drumming cemented a passion inside of me that has proven to be inextinguishable. Little did I know as a youth that this passion was only in its infancy as the true peak of inspiration and planting of passion hadn’t yet been realized until I landed in Wichita, Kansas to attend the Wichita State University. It is here in Wichita where I discovered the steelpan, often referred to as the steel drum or simply pan instrument. Here in the center of America is where I met Dr. Ellie Mannette (1927 - 2018) and who is known as the father of the modern steel drum. Meeting Dr. Mannette, as well as the great Andy Narell in these early formative collegiate years cemented a passion for the pan instrument and its artform. In my little Kansas oasis I launched first to Trinidad, West Indies, and then to Los Angeles where my passions took on new life and developed experiences such as touring with Scott Weiland (Stone Temple Pilots, Velvet Revolver), performing with Cyndy Lauper, recording for Ryan Gosling, traveling around the country with Cipes and the People, landing a record deal with Babylon Saints, facilitating classes for Drumming for Your Life Institute, being a teaching artist for the Music Center & LA Arts Group, and creating my Caribbean Drum Circle and Feel Breathe Move interactive programs. And, after 21 years on the West Coast, it is here, back in Kansas, where I’ve returned to reinvent myself, yet with that same burning passion as my inextinguishable foundation. Through all the years of being involved with and in music, as well as education, and the interplay of the two, I’ve come to embrace my ability to communicate my passion through the arts, and most importantly, my ability to be of service to others by doing so. Having a passion for music, and specifically drumming has allowed me to tap in and realize some of the many metaphors for life that involve “drumming”. Such as “march to the beat of your own drum”. I’m extremely enthusiastic at being back at Wichita State University as a graduate student pursuing a Master’s Degree in Music Education, Special Education. Having a Special Education credential, as well as my master’s degree will prepare me for the next stage of my musical journey, not only as an educator and teaching artist, but as a person of service. I once was asked, “What does success in life mean to you?” A poem I wrote sums it up: Life To take in all that is given to you Is to say life is one big sponge Soaking And Soaking Until the day you can squeeze it And give back your knowledge. The older I get the more I recognize the benefits of my own orientation towards being of service to others and having an attitude of gratitude for isn’t this what life is meant to be? Musically Yours, Joseph “Panhead” Peck
Contact Joseph Peck (Panhead)
Painting with Sound
We all can benefit from silencing what is around and within us. Now is that time. You have arrived. Welcome to Active Relaxation. Simply FEEL where you are at. BREATHE into the space. MOVE your entire essence into a state of TRANQUILITY.
MAJK
Joseph Peck - steelpans
Kenneth Karlin - keyboards
Heartfully Awake
Heartfully Awake explores the merging of human biological sounds with the dynamic nature of the steelpan instrument.
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Slow Sunrise Flow
The first track on Joseph Peck's debut solo album Steelpan Meditations, Vol. 1
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