Jimmy Cliff

With over 20 albums to date, Jimmy Cliff has always been one of the brightest stars of Jamaica's thriving musical culture and was among first to bring reggae to a worldwide audience. Born in St James, Jamaica, Cliff moved to Kingston as a teenager and had his first hits, "Hurricane Hattie" and "Dearest Beverley", with Lesley Kong in 1963, after impressing the producer with an impromptu a cappella performance in Kong's ice-cream parlour. Their working partnership continued until Kong's death. Together they produced some of the best known tunes of the ska era, including "Miss Jamaica" and "King of Kings". It was at the recording sessions for "Miss Jamaica" that Cliff met the young Bob Marley, whom Cliff helped record his first single "Judge Not". Over the course of the next decades the two went on to create modern reggae music. As Cliff points out: "Today's reggae music has gone through many formulations. Originally known as ska, it has evolved to "rock steady" to modern reggae, in its different forms".