Joe Higgs
Encyclopedia
Joe Higgs was a reggae
musician from Jamaica
. In the late 1950s and 1960s he was part of the duo Higgs and Wilson
together with Roy Wilson. He was a popular artist in Jamaica for four decades and is also known for his work tutoring younger musicians including The Wailers and Jimmy Cliff
.
, both as a solo artist and with Roy Wilson. He is often called the "Godfather of Reggae". His first release (with Wilson) was "Oh Manny Oh" in 1958, which was one of the first records to be pressed in Jamaica and went on to sell 50,000 copies. Higgs and Wilson also recorded for Clement "Coxsone" Dodd in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The partnership with Wilson dissolved in 1964 when Wilson emigrated to the United States. Higgs then concentrated on a solo career and also worked with Carlos Malcolm
and the Afro-Jamaican Rhythms, before joining Lynn Taitt
's The Soul Brothers as lead vocalist.
Higgs mentored young singers in his yard and began working with Bob Marley
in 1959. In fact, it was at one of the informal music lessons Joe Higgs held in Trench Town, that Bob and Bunny Livingston met Peter Tosh
. Marley acknowledged later on that Higgs had been an influential figure for him, while Higgs described their time together: "I am the one who taught the Wailers the craft, who taught them certain voice technique". It was Higgs who introduced the Wailers to Dodd in 1963. Higgs has also been described as the "Father of Reggae" by Jimmy Cliff
. For a while Higgs toured with Cliff, acting as his bandleader as well as writing songs for Cliff including "Dear Mother", and also performed with The Wailers
on their US tour when Bunny Wailer
refused to go on the tour in 1973. Higgs wrote "Steppin' Razor" in 1967 as his entry in the Festival Song Contest, later recorded by Tosh without crediting Higgs. Higgs later won a court case to establish his rights as composer but never received any profits from the song's success.
Higgs won the Jamaican Tourist Board Song Competition in 1972 with "Invitation to Jamaica", released as a single on his own Elevation label, and much of his best-known solo work was issued in the 1970s. Singles included "More Slavery" (released on Micron), "Creation" (Ethnic Fight), "Let Us Do Something" (Elevation), and "World Is Upside Down" (Island). His debut album, Life of Contradiction
, had been recorded in 1972 for Island Records
, but as Island boss Chris Blackwell
felt that it would be difficult to market it remained unreleased until 1975, when it was issued by Micron Music, and has been described as "a seminally sophisticated work combining reggae, jazz, and rhythm and blues influences to create a new texture that would have a profound effect on the best Jamaican music to follow". As well as The Wailers, Higgs also helped several other singers and groups including The Wailing Souls
. His second album, Unity Is Power, was released in 1979 and further singles followed on Cliff's Sunpower label and Bunny Wailer's Solominic imprint. His 1983 single "So It Go", with a lyric critical of the Jamaican government of the day was banned from airplay and led to harassment which would eventually lead to Higgs relocating to Los Angeles
, where he lived for the rest of his life. Two further albums were released in the 1980s, Triumph (1985) and Family (1988), and in 1990 he recorded Blackman Know Yourself on which he was backed by the Wailers Band
, and includes covers of the Marley/Lee Perry songs "Small Axe" and "Sun Is Shining". In 1995, his final album was issued, Joe and Marcia Together, a collaboration with his daughter.
A majority of Higgs' songs were connected to his impoverished life in Trenchtown
where he grew up. Higgs considered that it was out of the poverty and violence of Kingston
's shantytowns such as Trenchtown and Johnstown that the reggae music had grown. Before reggae hit big on the western music scene with Bob Marley, it was understood as a "ghetto
music". Higgs was the very first artist out the ghetto music scene to have lyrics which primarily dealt with every day troubles. In his own words:
Higgs died of cancer
on 18 December 1999 at Kaiser Hospital in Los Angeles. At the time of his death he was working with Roger Steffens
on an official biography, and had been working on a collaboration with Irish artists for the Green on Black album. He was survived by twelve children, including his daughter Marcia, who is a rapper, and son Peter, a studio guitarist.
In 2007, the Joe Higgs Music Awards were established in his honour.
Contributions to other albums:
Reggae
Reggae is a music genre first developed in Jamaica in the late 1960s. While sometimes used in a broader sense to refer to most types of Jamaican music, the term reggae more properly denotes a particular music style that originated following on the development of ska and rocksteady.Reggae is based...
musician from Jamaica
Jamaica
Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...
. In the late 1950s and 1960s he was part of the duo Higgs and Wilson
Higgs and Wilson
Higgs and Wilson were a Jamaican singing duo, consisting of Joe Higgs and Roy Wilson.Higgs And Wilson were one of Jamaica's first indigenous recording artists, and their debut single, "Oh Manny Oh", sold over 50,000 copies in Jamaica in 1960. In the early 1960s they worked with the producer Coxsone...
together with Roy Wilson. He was a popular artist in Jamaica for four decades and is also known for his work tutoring younger musicians including The Wailers and Jimmy Cliff
Jimmy Cliff
Jimmy Cliff, OM is a Jamaican musician, singer and actor. He is the only currently living musician to hold the Order of Merit, the highest honour that can be granted by the Jamaican government for achievement in the arts and sciences...
.
Biography
Higgs was instrumental in the foundation of modern Jamaican music, first recording in 1958 for producer and businessman (and later Jamaican Prime Minister) Edward SeagaEdward Seaga
Edward Philip George Seaga ON PC was the fifth Prime Minister of Jamaica from 1980 to 1989 and Leader of the Jamaica Labour Party from 1974 to 2005. He served as leader of the opposition from 1974 to 1980 and again from 1989 until January 2005...
, both as a solo artist and with Roy Wilson. He is often called the "Godfather of Reggae". His first release (with Wilson) was "Oh Manny Oh" in 1958, which was one of the first records to be pressed in Jamaica and went on to sell 50,000 copies. Higgs and Wilson also recorded for Clement "Coxsone" Dodd in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The partnership with Wilson dissolved in 1964 when Wilson emigrated to the United States. Higgs then concentrated on a solo career and also worked with Carlos Malcolm
Carlos Malcolm
Carlos Malcolm is a Jamaican trombonist, percussionist and bandleader who was most popular in the late 1950s and 1960s.-Biography:Carlos Malcolm was born in Panama c.1935 to Jamaican parents and grew up in Kingston. His father, Wilfred Malcolm , went to Panama and worked as a bookkeeper in the...
and the Afro-Jamaican Rhythms, before joining Lynn Taitt
Lynn Taitt
Lynn Taitt was a reggae guitarist born in San Fernando, Trinidad and Tobago, closely associated with Jamaican rocksteady music.-Biography:...
's The Soul Brothers as lead vocalist.
Higgs mentored young singers in his yard and began working with Bob Marley
Bob Marley
Robert Nesta "Bob" Marley, OM was a Jamaican singer-songwriter and musician. He was the rhythm guitarist and lead singer for the ska, rocksteady and reggae band Bob Marley & The Wailers...
in 1959. In fact, it was at one of the informal music lessons Joe Higgs held in Trench Town, that Bob and Bunny Livingston met Peter Tosh
Peter Tosh
Peter Tosh, born Winston Hubert McIntosh , was a Jamaican reggae musician who was a core member of the band The Wailers , and who afterward had a successful solo career as well as being a promoter of Rastafari.Peter Tosh was born in Grange Hill, Jamaica, an illegitimate child to a mother too young...
. Marley acknowledged later on that Higgs had been an influential figure for him, while Higgs described their time together: "I am the one who taught the Wailers the craft, who taught them certain voice technique". It was Higgs who introduced the Wailers to Dodd in 1963. Higgs has also been described as the "Father of Reggae" by Jimmy Cliff
Jimmy Cliff
Jimmy Cliff, OM is a Jamaican musician, singer and actor. He is the only currently living musician to hold the Order of Merit, the highest honour that can be granted by the Jamaican government for achievement in the arts and sciences...
. For a while Higgs toured with Cliff, acting as his bandleader as well as writing songs for Cliff including "Dear Mother", and also performed with The Wailers
Bob Marley
Robert Nesta "Bob" Marley, OM was a Jamaican singer-songwriter and musician. He was the rhythm guitarist and lead singer for the ska, rocksteady and reggae band Bob Marley & The Wailers...
on their US tour when Bunny Wailer
Bunny Wailer
Bunny Wailer, , also known as Bunny Livingston and affectionately as Jah B, is a singer songwriter and percussionist and was an original member of reggae group The Wailers along with Bob Marley and Peter Tosh...
refused to go on the tour in 1973. Higgs wrote "Steppin' Razor" in 1967 as his entry in the Festival Song Contest, later recorded by Tosh without crediting Higgs. Higgs later won a court case to establish his rights as composer but never received any profits from the song's success.
Higgs won the Jamaican Tourist Board Song Competition in 1972 with "Invitation to Jamaica", released as a single on his own Elevation label, and much of his best-known solo work was issued in the 1970s. Singles included "More Slavery" (released on Micron), "Creation" (Ethnic Fight), "Let Us Do Something" (Elevation), and "World Is Upside Down" (Island). His debut album, Life of Contradiction
Life of Contradiction
Life of Contradiction is was the first album of reggae musician Joe Higgs. It was recorded in 1972 and released in 1975.The album has been described by the BBC as "a highly conceptual, deeply personal record by one of reggae’s true masters that deserves to cross over into popular music’s wider...
, had been recorded in 1972 for Island Records
Island Records
Island Records is a record label that was founded by Chris Blackwell in Jamaica. It was based in the United Kingdom for many years and is now owned by Universal Music Group...
, but as Island boss Chris Blackwell
Chris Blackwell
Christopher Percy Gordon "Chris" Blackwell is a British record producer and businessman, who was the founder of Island Records, acknowledged as the most successful and groundbreaking independent record company in history. Blackwell has been a music industry mogul for over fifty years...
felt that it would be difficult to market it remained unreleased until 1975, when it was issued by Micron Music, and has been described as "a seminally sophisticated work combining reggae, jazz, and rhythm and blues influences to create a new texture that would have a profound effect on the best Jamaican music to follow". As well as The Wailers, Higgs also helped several other singers and groups including The Wailing Souls
The Wailing Souls
The Wailing Souls are a Jamaican reggae vocal group still recording and performing live, whose origins date back to the 1960s.-Career:They have recorded with many top Jamaican record producers including Coxsone Dodd of Studio One, Lloyd "King Jammy" James, Henry "Junjo" Lawes, Delroy Wilson and...
. His second album, Unity Is Power, was released in 1979 and further singles followed on Cliff's Sunpower label and Bunny Wailer's Solominic imprint. His 1983 single "So It Go", with a lyric critical of the Jamaican government of the day was banned from airplay and led to harassment which would eventually lead to Higgs relocating to Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, where he lived for the rest of his life. Two further albums were released in the 1980s, Triumph (1985) and Family (1988), and in 1990 he recorded Blackman Know Yourself on which he was backed by the Wailers Band
Wailers Band
The Wailers Band are a reggae band formed by the remaining members of Bob Marley & The Wailers, following the death of Bob Marley in 1981.-Previous Wailers' incarnations:The Wailers started as Bob Marley, Bunny Wailer and Peter Tosh...
, and includes covers of the Marley/Lee Perry songs "Small Axe" and "Sun Is Shining". In 1995, his final album was issued, Joe and Marcia Together, a collaboration with his daughter.
A majority of Higgs' songs were connected to his impoverished life in Trenchtown
Trenchtown
Trench Town is a neighborhood located in the parish of St. Andrew which shares municipality with Kingston, the capital and largest city of Jamaica. In the 1960s Trench Town was known as the Hollywood of Jamaica. Today Trench Town boasts the Trench Town Culture Yard Museum, a visitor friendly...
where he grew up. Higgs considered that it was out of the poverty and violence of Kingston
Kingston, Jamaica
Kingston is the capital and largest city of Jamaica, located on the southeastern coast of the island. It faces a natural harbour protected by the Palisadoes, a long sand spit which connects the town of Port Royal and the Norman Manley International Airport to the rest of the island...
's shantytowns such as Trenchtown and Johnstown that the reggae music had grown. Before reggae hit big on the western music scene with Bob Marley, it was understood as a "ghetto
Ghetto
A ghetto is a section of a city predominantly occupied by a group who live there, especially because of social, economic, or legal issues.The term was originally used in Venice to describe the area where Jews were compelled to live. The term now refers to an overcrowded urban area often associated...
music". Higgs was the very first artist out the ghetto music scene to have lyrics which primarily dealt with every day troubles. In his own words:
"Music is a matter of struggle. It's not good that it's known you're from Trenchtown. Reggae is a confrontation of sound. Reggae has to have that basic vibrant sound that is to be heard in the ghetto. It's like playing the drum and bass very loud. Those are the basic sounds. A classical reggae should be accepted in any part of the world. Freedom, that's what it's asking for; acceptance, that's what it needs, and understanding, that's what reggae's saying. You have a certain love come from hard struggle, long suffering. Through pain you guard yourself with that hope of freedom, not to give up...""
Higgs died of cancer
Cancer
Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...
on 18 December 1999 at Kaiser Hospital in Los Angeles. At the time of his death he was working with Roger Steffens
Roger Steffens
Roger Steffens is a Brooklyn, New York born actor, author, lecturer, editor, reggae archivist, photographer, producer. Roger is perhaps best known for his reggae archives, in particular his archives of Bob Marley. Six rooms of his home in Los Angeles house his archives, which include the world's...
on an official biography, and had been working on a collaboration with Irish artists for the Green on Black album. He was survived by twelve children, including his daughter Marcia, who is a rapper, and son Peter, a studio guitarist.
In 2007, the Joe Higgs Music Awards were established in his honour.
Quotations
From memorial website:- "Joe Higgs was a brother amongst the Wailers for years. He was encouragement, and he inspired us and kept us together." - Peter ToshPeter ToshPeter Tosh, born Winston Hubert McIntosh , was a Jamaican reggae musician who was a core member of the band The Wailers , and who afterward had a successful solo career as well as being a promoter of Rastafari.Peter Tosh was born in Grange Hill, Jamaica, an illegitimate child to a mother too young...
(1976)
- "We looked up to Joe Higgs. He was something like a musical guardian for us. He was a more professional singer, because he was working for years with a fella named Roy Wilson as Higgs & Wilson. They had a lotta hits and they had the knowledge of the harmony techniques, so he taught us [The Wailers] them. And he helped in the studio, to work out our different parts." - Bunny Wailer (1980's)
- "Joe Higgs helped me understand that music. He taught me many things." - Bob MarleyBob MarleyRobert Nesta "Bob" Marley, OM was a Jamaican singer-songwriter and musician. He was the rhythm guitarist and lead singer for the ska, rocksteady and reggae band Bob Marley & The Wailers...
Discography
- Life of ContradictionLife of ContradictionLife of Contradiction is was the first album of reggae musician Joe Higgs. It was recorded in 1972 and released in 1975.The album has been described by the BBC as "a highly conceptual, deeply personal record by one of reggae’s true masters that deserves to cross over into popular music’s wider...
(1975), Micron - Unity is Power (1979), IslandIsland RecordsIsland Records is a record label that was founded by Chris Blackwell in Jamaica. It was based in the United Kingdom for many years and is now owned by Universal Music Group...
/1 Stop - Triumph (1985), Alligator
- Family (1988), ShanachieShanachie RecordsShanachie Records was founded in 1976 by Richard Nevins and Dan Collins. According to Harvey Pekar , it is one of the largest independent record labels in the world, and is currently distributed by E1 Music. Starting as a label that specialized in fiddle music, they began releasing work by Celtic...
- Blackman Know Yourself (1990), Shanachie - Joe Higgs with the Wailers
- Joe and Marcia Together (1995)
Contributions to other albums:
- NegrilNegril (Peter Tosh album)Negril is an instrumental album originally released in 1975 from a session produced, arranged and mostly composed by Eric Gale, and including some of Jamaica's best-known musicians...
(LP, 1975. Micron Music Ltd.) (CD, 2003. 3D Japan), session musician
External links
- Memorial
- Respect Is Overdue by Daniel & Seth Nelson
- Joe Higgs Music Awards