PATRONS who took in Friday’s concert at Redbones Blues Café in St Andrew were given a treat by trombonist Nambo Robinson, his I-dren Workshop band and influential roots group Mystic Revelation of Rastafari (MRR).

Dubbed Freedom Sounds: A Celebration of Jamaican Music, the event also featured two budding bands from the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts.

First, it was Earth Cry followed by Therapy with vocalists Marcia Hurd and Nicolleen Brown who entertained with Want It Bad Enough, When The Rain Fall and Real Thing.

But it was the percussive legacy of noted Rastafarian drummer Oswald ‘Count Ossie’ Williams, founder of the MRR, that took pride of place.

The drummers from Rockfort in east Kingston kept the seminal sound established by the late ‘Count’ alive, with his son Count Ossie Junior, affectionately called Time, at the forefront.

“We come together for the preservation of the music from that time until now,” Nambo, who got his start with the MRR, told the appreciative audience.

Doubling on vocals, he led the group on the StrangeJah Cole anthem Bangarang, his original Give Thanks and Praises and Jah Jah Children.

It is 55 years since Count Ossie and the MRR played on the Folkes Brothers big hit, Oh Carolina. Led by Count Ossie (who died in 1976), the group recorded two outstanding albums, Groundation and Tales of Mozambique.