Reggae Icons to be Honoured By JARIA

Groundins

By: Charles H.E. Campbell

Today, March 1, the Jamaica Reggae Industry Association (JARIA) will host its inaugural Honour Awards at the Pegasus Hotel. The Honour Awards will seek to recognise individuals who played an instrumental role in the creation, evolution and development of the Reggae music industry and its various sub-genres. These icons and pioneers are achievers, responsible for a great volume of recorded works that spans Reggae through its various stages, phases and eras. Although some of these people are well known within the industry, their names and contribution may not be as popular within the broader community. Categories like the engineers and producers who work behind the scenes, who were there at the genesis of our music, are hardly ever featured in the blare of the media.

Sylvan Morris is a pioneering engineer and electronic technician who has made an indelible mark on the development of Jamaican music, being credited with creating the distinctive Studio One sound. He did seminal work at both Harry J’s and Dynamics Sounds. He has recorded some of the greatest Jamaican hit songs including the first four albums released on Island Records by Bob Marley and the Wailers and songs from the Harder They Come soundtrack performed by Jimmy Cliff.

In the 1960’s and 70’s, Syd Bucknor, a cousin of producer Clement Dodd, worked as an engineer at all the major studios in Kingston including Treasure Isle, Studio One, Dynamics Sounds and Channel One. He later continued this work in Britain, engineering for the Bob Marley, Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, the Wailers, Cimaroons, Max Romeo, Gladdy Anderson and Tommy McCook, among others. Bucknor mentored many of Reggae’s talented engineers including Overton ‘Scientist’ Brown and Mad Professor.

Producer Leslie Kong’s entrée into Reggae music in the early 1960’s was at the urging of Jimmy Cliff. This propelled him to produce some of the most outstanding recordings in the history of Jamaican popular music, including The Pioneers' Long Shot Kick The Bucket, The Melodians' Rivers of Babylon and Sweet Sensation, The Maytals 54-46 and their UK top charting single Monkey Man and Bob Marley’s first two recordings, Judge Not and One Cup Of Coffee. His productions with Derrick Morgan are some of the most memorable Ska and Rock Steady tunes, having formed the basis of the now legendary rivalry between Derrick Morgan and Prince Buster. Kong became the first locally-based Jamaican producer to get an international Rock Steady hit- in 1967 with Desmond Dekker and the Aces’ 0-0-7 (Shanty Town), which they followed up in 1969 with Poor Mi Israelites, topping the UK Charts, going to the number nine spot on the US charts and selling over two million copies.

Sonia Pottinger is undisputedly the single most important woman involved in the seminal stage of Jamaica’s recorded music business, having produced artistes from the 1960’s until the mid-1980’s. She first opened her Tip Top Records Shop in the mid-1960s and started to record musicians in 1966. Baba Brooks, The Ethiopians, Delano Stewart, The Melodians, Ken Boothe, Alton Ellis and Toots and The Maytals were among the many artistes she recorded. In the 1970s, she produced albums by Bob Andy, Marcia Griffiths, Culture, U Roy and Big Youth. Among her most memorable hits is Marcia Griffith's version of Dreamland. In 1974 Mrs. Pottinger bought Treasure Isle from long time friend and fellow producer Duke Reid and has continued to reissue songs from that label.

Osbourne ‘King Tubby’ Ruddock, a brilliant engineer and electronic technician created the King Tubby Hi-Fi, as the successor to his original sound system called Hometown Hi-Fi. King Tubby Hi-Fi was known for its thunderous bass woofers, which could be heard for miles away, playing specials and roots music. The sound system was legendary for its use of echoes, reverbs, flanging and sound effects, which were custom built by Tubby himself. As such, Tubby is revered as the godfather of Dub, being the creator and main innovator of those production techniques characteristic of the Dub sub-genre.

Jah Love Music sound system disseminated the music of the philosophy of Rastafari, African consciousness, Pan-Africanism and black liberation. Brigadier Jerry with his brilliant speed-toasting provided the colouring for the conscious music which Jah Love was famous for. Other staples were Marley, Tosh, Burning Spear and the Abbysynians. Jah Love has made an outstanding contribution to the establishment of roots Reggae both nationally and internationally.

Ansell Collins is a giant of Jamaican music, a brilliant keyboardist, producer and vocalist. Collins was responsible for one of Jamaica’s first million sellers, Double Barrel featuring Dave Barker. He is also responsible for the famous rhythm track Stagalag 14 for producer Winston Riley, one of the most enduring rhythms that have been sampled by international recording artistes, including Alicia Keys. Collins has worked with most of the top Jamaican artistes from the 60’s through to the 80’s as musician and arranger. He continues to work as musician and vocalist in the Oneness band for Jimmy Cliff.

Many are captivated by the strains of Montego Rock but few are familiar with the name of its creator, Lenny Hibbert, the most accomplished Jamaican vibraphonist. The unforgettable Village Soul places Hibbert among the finest instrumentalists ever to have received the Studio One seal. Many musicians today owe their accomplishments to the mentoring and tutelage of Hibbert at Alpha Boys School and the Ocho Rios High School.

Pam Hall is a singer with a unique range and style who has thrilled audiences for three decades. The recordings which best define Hall as a solo artiste are I Was Born A Woman, from the soundtrack of the 1979 movie Children of Babylon, which became a bona fide Jamaican classic without being released as a single; the UK charting Dear Boopsie; and Perfidia. She also had a smash hit with the late Orville Wood as the duo, Pam and Woody, with the classic Book of Life. Hall perhaps is the most accomplished backing vocalist in Jamaica’s history. Her ability to reinvent songs like You Are Not Alone, How Glad I Am and Unbreak My Heart and make them her own, as well as her incredible vocal instrument, make Hall unique among her peers.

Mystic Revelation of Rastafari, lead by master drummer Count Ossie, was first known as Count Ossie and the African Drums. Prior to 1956, popular Jamaican music was Mento. It was not until Count Ossie drew on references from both Kumina and Burru, did Rastafarians begin to codify a unique musical identity. By attracting the best horn players to Wareika Hills to jam at grounations, these Rastafarian drummers played a seminal role in the development of popular Jamaican music. Oh! Carolina, featuring the drums of Rastafari, became the template for what would become Ska and its later derivatives. A cover of this recording catapulted Shaggy to occupy the number one spot on both sides of the Atlantic in the mid-1990s. The Mystic Revelation of Rastafari has lived the 52-year span that reflects the totality of our popular musical evolution.

I wish to thank Dennis Howard, Alvin Campbell, Herbie Miller and Clyde McKenzie for providing me with all the above data.

JARIA is a non-governmental, non-profit organisation which has been conceptualised and registered to unite and further the common interests of all individuals and firms directly and indirectly involved in the music industry of Jamaica; to facilitate access to networking, training, capacity building and financial support opportunities; to be an exemplary global music community for broadly increasing the economic, social and cultural wealth of Jamaica; to lobby government so as to impact industry-related public policies, laws and legislation and the review thereof, where deemed necessary; to establish an international record label- owned by the association- that will promote, distribute and publish music in all continents and regions of the world.

The main objective of this body is to reposition Jamaica at the centre of the global Reggae movement and culture, with the primary aim of commencing the complex process of repatriating our birthright and patrimony.

Email: che.campbell@gmail.com