And another chapter of Jamaican music history comes to a close. On March 5, Alerth Rockfort Bedasse, one of Jamaica's great singers of the 1950s, passed away. In some ways, his story was typical - a man from country comes to town in search of a better life - but his success and influence on Jamaican music was anything but. It was my great good fortune to have met the man and to have learned about his life.

Alerth was musically inclined from the time he was a boy growing up in Colonel's Ridge, Clarendon. He started simply enough, singing in school and at 4-H meetings, but always found himself drawn to the musicians playing in the dancehalls. Those were the days in northern Clarendon when fiddlers like Allen Bryan and Sam Dyer from Mocho, and saxophonist/fife man Joe Shepherd from Rock River led groups that played quadrilles and mentos at community events.

Wanting to make music, Alerth first tried his hand at the banjo ukulele at the behest of a local banjoist known simply as "Dicky," but it was not until Alerth's cousin gave him a guitar as a gift that he found new focus. Alerth worked hard on his new instrument, once telling me "the district was alarmed at how quickly I learned".

He made his public debut at a wedding dance only a couple of chains from where he lived. "That night, I cannot forget," Alerth explained, "I did my best. Everybody applaud me; it was the talk of the town that I was excellent."

He remained in Clarendon, playing in other people's groups until November 1949, when his aunt, a higgler, took him to Kingston. For the first month, he was without prospect, a self-described "vagabond." Then, out with his guitar one day in early 1950, a man approached him:
"Do you play guitar, sir?"
"Yes, I play guitar."
"There's a gentleman down Oxford Street that I know, sells a lot of tract, would like a guitarist to accompany him. I wonder if you'd go?"
"Take me to him right away."

The man looking for a guitarist was Everald F Williams. Originally from St Ann, Williams was a teacher who spent some years working in Cuba and should be recognised as one of Jamaica's greatest songwriters. Described as "a disciplined and orderly man", Alerth told me that Williams began writing songs and selling them as tracts after World War II, picking up where the duo Slim and Sam left off in the early 1940s.

By the end of the decade, Williams had many well-known songs to his credit. During that time, Williams mainly performed with the singer Arnold "Lord" Davey, but when Davey went his own way, Alerth's guitar playing and signature voice - now, one of mento's paradigmatic sounds - was a perfect fit.

Over the next decade, Williams and Bedasse worked together extensively. In 1953, the BBC was the first to capture the sound of Alerth's voice on a Williams composition, Calypso Greetings To The Queen, written on the occasion of her Jamaican visit. At this time, Alerth had only limited renown, although Williams' reputation was substantial; for example, Williams was behind every one of the recordings Harold Richardson and the Ticklers made at that time, including the hits Healing In The Balmyard and Glamour Gal.
Once Williams and Bedasse began making their own records, Alerth became a star in his own right.

One of the most important recordings he made was the notorious Night Food, a top-selling yet sexually explicit record released in 1955; its success eventually led the group to Ivan Chin, on whose Chin's Radio Service label the group made upwards of eighty sides between 1955 and 1957. Some of these records were traditional 'folk' songs, others sentimental originals.

The ones that had the most substantial impact, however, were the rude titles, including Rough Rider, Big Boy And Teacher, and Red Tomato, which not only captured the popular imagination, but became the subjects of a Parliamentary inquiry that looked to ban offensive calypsos in 1956.

By the end of the decade, the association had ended. Williams took a job with Wray and Nephew, and although Alerth continued his singing career for a time, he too moved on, becoming an accountant and raising a family. Although his career was short, Alerth's musical influence was substantial. Covers of the songs he and Williams made, have been recorded countless times by artistes including U-Roy, Joe Higgs and the Skatalites, while traces of Alerth's voice can be heard in the singing styles of important later artistes like Eric Donaldson and Stanley Beckford.

Through his music, Alerth certainly stands among the best, and future generations of musicians will undoubtedly help keep his legacy the talk of the town.

daniel.neely@nyu.edu

Jamaican Folk Singers concert season September 6-14

Adopt A Band

Summer ends with Summer's Cool this Saturday