the.com/steel drum

means A tuned percussion instrument made by hammering the end of a metal barrel into a patchwork of convex sections, each struck to sound a different pitch.

from Born in Trinidad in the mid-20th century, when drummers—shut out of traditional instruments by poverty and colonial-era bans on African drumming—turned to discarded oil barrels left over from the island's petroleum industry. Through trial, hammering, and tempering, they discovered that sinking and shaping sections of the barrel's end produced distinct musical tones. What began as improvisation with scrap metal became the pan, the only major acoustic instrument invented in the 20th century, and the heart of steelband and calypso music.