Free bass guitar lessons were given at Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts on February 4. That is where Back 2 Bass-es, an event showcasing six of reggae’s finest musicians, took place.

Errol “Flabba Holt” Carter, Daniel “Axeman” Thompson, Donald “Danny Bassie” Dennis, Boris Gardiner, Jackie Jackson, and Lloyd Parks revisited some of their finest moments, playing to a packed amphitheatre of students and mature patrons.

Their playing was interspersed with anecdotes of each song which held the attention of students and connoisseurs alike.

The event, produced by the Jamaica Reggae Industry Association (JaRIA), was endorsed by the musicians.

“Bwoy, mi love dis! Supn like dis should happen long time,” said Flabba Holt, founder of the Roots Radics Band. “Me’d a love carry dis guh Europe.”

Dennis, a member of The Firehouse Crew, agreed.

“People know the songs, but a lot of the time they don’t know the musicians. So, with something like this, they can put a face to the songs,” he said.

Dennis and Thompson spoke about their admiration for Holt, who played some of his famous bass lines which included Night Nurse by Gregory Isaacs, Don’t Want To Be No General by Dennis Brown, and Tune In by Gregory Isaacs.

Thompson, a leading session musician for 40 years, had the audience rocking to the grooves of Lazy Body by Echo Minott, Original Foreign Mind by Junior Reid, and Lots of Sign by Tenor Saw.

For lovers of more contemporary sounds, Dennis recalled his heyday on songs such as It’s Me Again Jah by Luciano, Thank You Mama from Sizzla, and Capleton’s Jah Jah City.

They set the pace for 90 minutes of classic rocksteady and roots-reggae tracks courtesy of Messrs Gardiner, Jackson and Parks.

Each gave stories about their time working with producers like Clement Dodd and Duke Reid and Joe Gibbs, and the talented artistes who recorded for them.

Jackson was in fine form on Alton Ellis’s Girl I’ve Got A Date and Get Ready Rocksteady, Don’t Stay Away by Phyllis Dillon, 54-46 by Toots and The Maytals, and The Wailers’ Hypocrites, Israelites by Desmond Dekker and The Aces, By The Rivers of Babylon by The Melodians, and Jimmy Cliff’s The Harder They Come.

On Don’t Stay Away, 54-46, Hypocrites, Israelites, By The Rivers of Babylon, and The Harder They Come, Jackson was accompanied on vocals by his daughter Courtni, a recent graduate of the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts.

Gardiner, a contemporary of Jackson’s, revelled on Pat Kelly’s You Don’t Care, The Heptones’ Why Did You Leave and Sea of Love.

He showed his reggae chops on the Lee “Scratch” Perry-produced War Ina Babylon by Max Romeo and Police And Thieves by Junior Murvin.

Parks, band leader for We The People Band, had the audience jumping to Ken Boothe’s Everything I Own, Beres Hammond’s Groovy Little Thing, Dennis Brown’s Should I, Inna Dis Ya Time by The Itals, and Number One by Gregory Isaacs.

On the latter, Parks saluted Sly Dunbar, who played drums on it 46 years ago.

Dunbar died on January 26.

The bass guitarists were accompanied by the Gen Z Band, led by saxophonist Dean Fraser, singers Dehdeh Blacks, Janeel Mills and Bijean Gayle.