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April 1, 2003 (letter to the editor featured in the Jamaica Gleaner internet edition)
Reggae Brings Back Love
THE EDITOR, Sir:
IT IS with a tremendous sense of pride and admiration I read the story featuring Luciano and his new release “Serve Jah.” Reggae music has long been one of Jamaica’s greatest natural resources and as Burning Spear might say “The World Should Know.” The impact and proposed social rehabilitation represented by reggae music could never be more important than it is today. Humanity is in chaos and spiritual soldiers like Luciano give hope and guidance to those who know not where to turn.
Music has profound inspiration and direction, unifying races and cultures through the common desire for love. Jamaica’s tremendous musical legacy is a treasure to be extremely proud of. Many of your artistes also give to local charities. Reggae is a tremendous draw for cultural tourism. Artists and promoters like Tony Rebel have contributed professional sophistication through showcases like the ever growing popular “Rebel Salute.”
I have been a visitor to Jamaica since the seventies. Reggae music is a critical part of the cultural and natural charisma of the country. Promoting, praising, and perpetuating the careers of your incredible reggae artistes will increase recognition and access to reggae music on a worldwide level, not only benefitting the beautiful little island of Jamaica, but worldwide humanity as well. MORE LOVE!
With loving praises,
I am etc.,
SISTA IRIE
sisirie@io.com
AZI FM radio, Austin, Texas
Via Go-Jamaica
January 31, 2003 (featured in the Jamaica Observer internet edition)
TONY CHIN… THE RHYTHM IN SOUL SYNDICATE
FOR much of the 1970s, one of the leading show and recording bands in Jamaica was the Soul Syndicate Band. It was a top-notch unit that included drummer Carlton “Santa” Davis, bass player George “Fully” Fullwood, and guitarists Earl “Chinna” Smith and Tony Chin.
Chin was born in Kingston; he grew up in Trench Town and Greenwich Farm, areas bursting at the seams with musical talent in the late 1960s when Chin began his recording career. An original member of the Soul Syndicate Band, one of Chin’s best-known songs from the early years was Bob Marley’s Mr Brown; but by 1972, the band had linked with upcoming producer Winston “Niney” Holness and a fast-rising teenaged singer named Dennis Brown.
Chin and the Soul Syndicate played on several of Brown’s hits for Holness, including Westbound Train and Cassandra. As their reputation grew, so did the demand for them to play for other acts including Ken Boothe (Silver Words); Johnny Clarke’s Move Outa Babylon; My Heart Is Gone by John Holt; Green Bay Killing by Big Youth and Uptown Top Ranking, a smash hit in Jamaica and the United Kingdom in 1977 for Althea and Donna.
His rhythmic runs can be heard on albums such as Burning Spear’s Marcus Garvey, Jimmy Cliff’s Follow My Mind and Judy Mowatt’s classic Black Woman.
Chin migrated to the United States in 1981 where he continued to record and play the club scene in Los Angeles. In 1994, Chin and Davis helped a California band called Big Mountain to the top of the Billboard charts with a remake of the Peter Frampton song, Baby I Love Your Way.
Now in his late ’40s, Chin continues to record. In 2000, his first album, Music & Me, was released.
Visit Tony Chin on-line at www.aboutTonyChin.com
February 7, 2003 (featured in the Jamaica Observer internet edition)
by Basil Walters
BOB MARLEY’S IMPACT ON INDIGENOUS PEOPLES
DESPITE Bob Marley’s international acclaim, and even though there have been a few calls for him to be elevated to the status of National Hero, the average Jamaican, even today, really does not have the faintest idea of the tremendous impact the late reggae icon has had on some indigenous peoples across the globe. In some places, the reggae icon, whose 58th birthday was celebrated yesterday, is even revered as a god.
“Part of the impact Bob had with respect to his work on earth, was the rallying of indigenous peoples. I think immediately of the Hopi Indians in the Grand Canyon. I actually met and got to know quite a few of them,” said marketing consultant for Tuff Gong, Colin Leslie.
“The Grand Canyon is so deep down below the surface of the earth, they couldn’t get radio waves. They probably still can’t get it. But they were all playing Bob Marley cassettes and listening to his message, so much so that years later I started seeing native American Indians coming to Jamaica for Reggae Sunsplash,” he added.
This view of Marley’s impact on indigenous peoples was shared by Robert Roskind, a white American author who is now in Jamaica on a crusade called, “The Gathering of the Healers” where he has been touring the island’s schools with popular entertainers promoting the message of “One Love”.
Roskind, who visited the Grand Canyon, related the following experiences; “When I was doing research for my book, Rasta Heart, I heard that Bob Marley’s music had 25 years ago, reached to the depths of the Grand Canyon where there is an ancient tribe of indians called the Havasupai. The Havasupai live in the most remote area of the US; they still get their mails delivered by horseback. And I was down there this summer (and) they still get their mails on horseback. And 25 years ago they had no power, no running water, no TV, no telephone. A very remote tribe of thousands of Indians, and about a thousand more live above it (the Grand Canyon).
“So I had heard that about 25 years ago, except for tribal drumming, they heard Bob Marley’s music and they went out and they bought these little portable cassettes and started listening to Bob Marley’s music.
“So this summer, my wife and I decided that we would go out there. So we go to Arizona and you park your car on the top of the Grand Canyon and you walk five and a half hours in a hundred and 15 degree temperature… and you walk in the village and they have Bob Marley T-shirts on. You go into the stores and they playing Bob Marley’s music. There are two Havasupai children named Denroy after Denroy Morgan. The entire tribe listens to Bob Marley and roots reggae music.”
Roskind, who last October organised an event in Portland called “The “Fire of Forgiveness”, said that when Marley heard of these people of the Grand Canyon, in 1978/79, he wanted to go and see for himself, but he died before fulfilling that desire.
However, Roskind said, the year after Marley’s passing, his mother performed there to over 2000 Havasupais who lined the waterfalls. “Bob’s mother played his music in front of their sacred waterfall until dawn,” Roskind said.
“We camped down there for a week. You are not allowed to walk through the village except to go to the cafe, the post office and the store. you are expected to hike another hour to the camp ground. So we start going to the cafe and we asked people how did Bob Marley’s music get down here. And they say to us, Idrian brought it down here. He is the last keeper of the secrets, his father was the last great medicine man and he gave Idrian all the secrets of the tribe.
“Idrian is a dread Rasta, Havasupai indian that speaks patois,” Roskind related.
They said Idrian, 25 years ago when he was 13, heard Bob Marley’s music ‘and since our tribe was trained in love, we never fought the white, we never fought the other Indian tribes, we never fought among ourselves. We were living in one love until the white men came and upset the culture. He brought it down and told us if we would listen to this music it would keep one love alive in the tribe,” Roskind recalled.
As if to make his point even more indelibly Roskind added: “Let me tell how deep your culture has gone and reggae music has gone…five hours away is the Hopi reservation, the Hopi reservation is the cousin of the Havasupai. In the last 20 years, the Hopi reservation has had 58 reggae concerts….so this vibration of One love coming out of Jamaica, could have skim right over the top of the Grand Canyon but didn’t. It went down into the Grand Canyon and activated it.
One Love in the most remote area of the US, and into the oldest Indian tribe in the country, the Hopis the most spiritual and activated them to such a degree, that they have a Hopi reggae deejay, Sister Parrot. Her name is Karen Abieta (and she is) a world famous Indian potter.”
But the Hopi and the Havasupai tribes are not the only indigenous people Bob Marley’s music has touched to such a degree.
Colin Leslie also spoke of a few others.
“I understand that in Australia and New Zealand the Maoris and the native aborigines also related to Bob’s music immensely. But what fascinated me most of all, is the fact that in Nepal, which is a strict Bhuddist society which has large colonies of Bhuddist monks, they actually worship Bob as a spiritual deity. They see him as the recarnation of Vishnu, which is a spiritual person that had died. And they see Bob Marley as the recarnation of Vishnu and they actually worship him,” Leslie said.