Watching musician Seretse Small on guitar you wouldn’t have the slightest idea that guitar was not his first love!

According to Small he really wanted to play the saxophone and then go on to drums but his dad could afford neither.

” I got caught, not with a guitar bug, but a music and culture bug in the 70’s primarily from being with my mother as she innovated Caribbean theatre at the Cultural Arts Centre at UWI,” recalled Small about his journey into music in an interview with Splash.

“My father played the guitar as an amateur. He entered the festival competition and was the first president of the Guitar Society and generally played the classical guitar at home as a hobby. He also played the guitar for me to go to sleep from time to time. That made the guitar a special instrument for me and allowed me to memorise some basic classical guitar pieces,” the top class musician continued.

With heavy musical influence from his mother and father, it is not surprising that young Small would soon be seeking a chance at making history and contributing to the culture of the Caribbean and Jamaica.

With that dream determined by him, Small went about getting the desired training to make his mark. It started with his taking classical guitar lessons at the Creative Arts Centre, UWI then being mentored in pop and improvisation by Jon Williams and Andrew Simpson, to being enrolled in the Certification of Afro-American Music at the Jamaica School of Music, earning a diploma in music at Edna Manley College and performing at the Berklee Jazz College in Boston on a summer performance programme.

Today, Seretse can keep his audience spellbound and entranced as he strums the guitar but he will be the first to tell you that there really is no such thing as a ‘rhythm guitar’.

“In contemporary music there are often two functions that a guitarist will perform, one is to play rhythm and the other is to play lead. Back in the day there were bands that had two guitarists and there often was one of the guitarists who was exceptional at performing entertaining solos and he became known as the lead guitarist. The other guitarist would focus on playing chords and rhythmic patterns. Thus became known as a rhythm guitarist. I am not a rhythm guitarist. I am a guitarist. I have equal abilities as a soloist and an accompanist. I am hired mostly for my ability to solo, especially in a jazz vein. But I am an all round guitarist playing classical, reggae, dancehall, Rock etc,” Small pointed out about his musical passion.

Small’s encouragement to persons who have a similar drive is to “be passionate”. “Guitarists need to be humble and accept the secondary role that they have in music and celebrate it. They need to have powers of concentration that allow them to be steady in terms of tempo and be able to play the same thing over and over. They need to have a keen attention to detail. To guitarists I say, become an all round guitarist able to perform in many styles and roles because times are different and it is unlikely that you will be able to have a meaningful career specialising in lead or rhythm,” were the sage words coming from Small.

Commenting on today’s beats he says its a product of economics and technology. “The producers are doing the best that they can with limited opportunity and resources. They do well within the limitation… however we need to expand the palette of sounds and production approaches to become truly international. This will take investment and cannot be laid on the small shoulders of our young producers doing their thing in their personal studios,” he pointed out.

Born and grown in Jamaica, Small’s mother hails from Guyana while his father roots is in Trinidad.

A musician now for over 30 years, Sereste has performed with Sean Paul, have his own company – Griot Music since 1995, he holds the franchise for the Global battle of the bands and the band sent this year Dubtonic Kru.

“I am passionate about live music and making Jamaica the live music capital of the world,” Small passionately declares.