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Info: Caribbean Music

Reggae Music: Description

Reggae originated in Jamaica in the late 1960s. The term also denotes the modern popular music of Jamaica and its diaspora.  A 1968 single by the band Toots and the Maytals, “Do the Reggay” was the first popular song to use the word “reggae”, effectively naming the genre .

Immediate origins of reggae were the traditional mento (a celebratory, rural folk form), calypso, later on ska, rocksteady and blue beat. These were  strongly influenced by American jazz and rhythm & blues; Reggae itself became soon deeply linked to the Rastafari religion and  its popular gospel. Reggae musicians became a messenger and made several Rasta chants popular.

The most easily recognizable reggae elements are the staccato guitar chords on the offbeats; too, reggae tempo is usually slower than ska and rocksteady, the sound strongly led by a dominant drum and bass. The bass sound in reggae is thick and heavy, lower frequencies emphasized. Reggae is mainly sung in Jamaican English, the lyrics often contain social criticism as well as personal subjects and religion.

Reggae has spread around the world, often incorporating local genres and instruments (details see here) – since the late 1960s reggae  mainly in the UK,  later also in Subsaharan Africa and Latin America (as reggaeton). Meanwhile reggae music has even been included in the UNESCO list of world cultural  heritage.

(See also Tsetse workshop on reggae).

 

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