The future needs your help
Ileft the community of Hayes in Clarendon, Jamaica, at the tender age of seven years old. It would be unfair of me to say I knew what I was doing then but I will say that my journey into music was certainly a spiritual move and not just a move to become a star. I really had no idea how this would work for me but there was always a feeling of wanting to do this and the drive to fulfil it was certain. In other words, I wanted it badly.
In fact the driving force was to help my mother and the rest of the family.
Looking back at the journey, it hasn’t been an easy one but certainly an interesting one. I am trying to reserve some of the bad moments for my book but I like to talk about the good times, since that’s what I’ve been striving for all my life. For me, doing music for survival makes my approach to it completely different. I realised I have to develop a sense of discipline and hard work to make this a reality and not to leave out patience, which is a virtue.
When I first came into the music and entered through the gates of the great Studio One, it was a time considered to be, I believe, when the great of the greats were there in terms of musicians. At that time acts such as
The Skatalites – I need not say more about greatness and “natural-born” talent – were there. Then in terms of singers it was a very inspiring time as I saw Toots and the Maytals, The Wailers, The Gaylads, The Heptones, Bob Andy, The Clarendonians, just to name a few.
This made me want to be one of them. I watched ska, to rocksteady, reggae, followed by a real era of solid dancehall music. Thanks to a solid set of producers such as Sly and Robbie, Steelie and Clevie, Dave Kelly, Lenky Marsden, Danny Browne, then Don Corleon, Stephen Mcgregor, and Rvssian.
In checking out the current situation I have come to realise that after the last three names mentioned above we have found ourselves in a production deficit. Note that I mentioned The Skatalites and how talented they were. Those talents were definitely God-given, no one can deny that. Leaves me to wonder, have the creative musical juices all dried up?
We are definitely not creating any more. Or is it that the current output just doesn’t match up to where we are coming from? So this is what I’m thinking. If we are not doing better today than we were back then, clearly we are not growing. So it is no wonder that other musicians and artistes who love our music have no problem delving into our musical culture – and we shouldn’t feel mad about it. In fact, we should be very happy that other people love our culture and music so much that they choose to join our fold. This is a good thing. We need to be way more creative so they can follow us, and not the other way around.
Right now we are following the trend in the United States of America with this thing called trap music, and what is really happening is that we are trapping ourselves with something that is not Jamaican. Are we lost?
We shouldn’t be, not with the vast catalogue of music that Jamaica possesses. If the creative juices are running low then it is time to revert to what we have and even tweak it to be a little different. We can still create magic with what we have. I am not suggesting that the younger producers don’t have it but we need to see it. I oftentimes wonder, “Where is the next Dennis Brown, the next Beres, the next Marcia Griffiths, etc?” We need to develop this new breed of artistes or else where will we be in five years?
Another sore point for me is the lack of support for our music and culture. It is quite embarrassing when I look at a number of countries where governments support music culture...we don’t. There are so many successful businesses and individuals here in Jamaica. They all claim to love the music and keep suggesting that artistes and musicians should build the industry by ourselves. This shows that they themselves don’t understand the music business. This stand-off, stay away attitude by the private and public sector here in Jamaica contributes to the downfall of the local music industry. From the perspective of many looking on, Jamaican entertainers are rich. We all know that is not so.
I’ve always said where there is no vision the people perish. We look to our leaders and those in our country who really mean this country well to make lifelong investments in our country, especially in the arts. I would like to suggest that Prime Minister Holness look into the suggestion for an investment in our music and culture. Can you imagine we have so much land at Heroes’ Circle that we could build a wax museum to display all of our great talents from sports, music, horse racing and our national heroes, etc? I think Kingston could have one of the biggest tourist attractions in the entire Caribbean region.
Mr Prime Minister, private and public sector partnership is the way to go. Sir, have a talk with some of our leaders of industry in our country to see what can be done. Not only will it generate cash but it would be the first of its kind in the region; we have always been trendsetters, not followers, so let’s continue. Since the argument has always been that the Government doesn’t do anything for music and the arts the way they do for sports, here is something the Government can do for all of us.
Freddie Mcgregor is a reggae artiste of international repute. The former chair of the Jamaica Reggae Industry Association
(JARIA) made his big step into the history of Jamaican music in 1963 he joined with Ernest Wilson and Peter Austin to form The Clarendonians, and began to record for the Studio One label. He has worked his since then to become one of the foremost voices of the reggae genre. His popularity soared in the early 1980s with the release of Bobby Bobylon. Other popular hits of Mcgregor’s include Big Ship, Push Come to Shove, Just Don’t Want to Be Lonely, which became a a top ten hit in the UK, and I Was Born a Winner. He established the Big Ship label in 1983 and has produced many artistes including Papa San, Lieutenant Stitchie, Tiger, Luciano and Mikey Spice. Mcgregor received a Grammy nomination for Best Reggae Album for his 2002 project Anything for You.