Official Reggae & Ska History: Alpha Boys School History Jamaica Exclusive Tour & Jamaica Live Performances 2024 ™

The true story of the school that started a musical revolution.

The Alpha Boys School in Kingston has produced some of the finest musicians to come out of Jamiaca. Founded in the 1880s by Sisters of Mercy nuns, it has been the nursery for the luminaries of Jamaican jazz, ska and reggae.

Four of the original Skatalies went there, Tommy McCook, Lester Sterling, Johnny Moore and Don Drummond as well as countless other great singers and players. The list reads like a Who's Who of reggae: Johhny Osbourne, Desmond Dekker, Yellowman, Leroy Smart, Dawn Penn, Rico Rodriguez, Leroy 'Horsemouth' Wallace, Eddie 'TanTan' Thornton, Owen Gray, Bobby Ellis, Tony Gregory, Floyd Lloyd Seivrieght, 'Deadly' Headley Bennett, JoJo Bennett, Winston 'Mr Fix It' Francis, Karl Bryan and Cedric 'Im' Brooks all attended Alpha. In the jazz world, Joe Harriott, Bertie King, Wilton and Harold Gaynair, and Dizzy Reece. Also, the first ever black man to conduct the London Symphony Orchestra, Dr. Leslie Thompson, back in the 1940s was an Alpharian.

Ska and reggae music has reverbarated around the planet but without the musical brilliance of the graduates of Jamaica’s Alpha Boys’ School it might never have been that way.

From the Jamaican big band swing of the 1940s and ’50s through the ska and rocksteady of the 1960s, the global roots reggae explosion of the 1970s and the rise of the new dancehall style in the 1980s, graduates of Alpha Boys’ School have been right at the heart of the musical action, composing, arranging and playing on thousands of the most beloved Jamaican records of all time.

Facing a life of poverty, neglect, abandonment and even homelessness, young boys from the most deprived parts of Kingston were placed at Alpha, a residential home run by a strict order of Roman Catholic nuns. Alongside industrial trade apprenticeships, boys would fight for a prestigous place in the Alpha school band, overseen for an astonishing 64 years by the jazz-loving Sister Mary Ignatius – the true Godmother of Ska and Reggae.

Operated by the Sisters of Mercy in Kingston, Jamaica, the Alpha Vocational Training Centre provides holistic training to at-risk young men 16-20 years old. Our comprehensive programme focuses on individual needs and practical solutions through a targeted mix of academic, vocational and social services. Guided by 140+ years of service, Alpha’s culture of caring and committed support means young people and their families have a reliable partner for personal and professional development. At Alpha, we train for life!

Make a difference and make a donation to Alpha boys school use PayPal to make a direct donation to the Alpha music programme. 100% of your gift supports vocational training for youth at the Alpha Institute.


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Official Gemini Sound System ft Welton Irie, Johnny Ringo, Squiddly Ranks at Stoke Newington 1983

The Gemini sound system can be traced back to around 1967 when two men Papa Gemini (b. Gerwin Dinnall) and Papa Kenneth started a small disco that mainly catered for the sound of soul music. As with most sound systems of the day, Gemini’s set initially consisted of a single turntable, and theirs was powered by a Dynaco amplifier. Papa Gemini was the main selector in those early days and with reggae gaining in popularity in the seventies the set started to grow in size.

In 1974 Archie (b. Archibald Cummings) was recruited as the main selector and as Gemini’s rise continued they started to attract some of the top deejays of the day. Welton Irie (b. Welton Dobson) first began deejaying the set around 1978. He then had a short spell with Virgo before returning Gemini and linked up with another deejay Ringo (b. Bradley Miller), who was originally a selector on Soul Express, and their working partnership was crucial to the sound progress.

This was the dawning of the dancehall era and their mixture of reality and slackness lyrics quickly become all the rage. According to Welton Irie, Gemini was one of the very first sounds to cut their own custom-made “specials”. In particular, he remembers a series of “specials” that ruling deejay Ranking Trevor cut for the sound so they could champion themselves when no entertainers were around.

Around the turn of the next decade, the owner of the sound Papa Gemini decided to open his own club and he took over the La Exotica Club located at 39 Half Way Tree Road, Kingston 5 and he renamed it the Gemini Club. The club was ideally placed midway between uptown and downtown and its Wednesday night dances soon began to attract the crowds through the door and the entertainers to the set.

Among the deejays who got their break on Gemini were Squiddly Ranking (b. Michael Clarke), younger brother to Peter Metro, and Burro Banton (b. Donovan Spalding) who became a regular after impressing the owner one Wednesday night. Others likely to be found on Gemini in the early eighties were deejays Dicky Ranking (b. Norman Suppria), Lee Van Cleef (b. Devon Perkins), Ranking Toyon (b. Byron Letts), Lui Lepke, Michael Irie and singers such as Hugh Griffiths and Michael Palmer.

The Gemini equipment was also one of the best, producing a heavy, crystal-clear sound. Welton Irie had no doubts, “It sounded damn good, nothing sounded like Gemini”. Unsurprisingly with all this talent around Gemini was crowned Jamaican champion sound for 1981.

Official Reggae History: Bongo Herman Exclusive Interview Live in Jamaica 🇯🇲 2024
Herman Davis better known as Bongo Herman, is a Jamaican hand-drummer, percussionist and singer who has had a successful career stretching back to the early 1960s.
Herman Davis was born on 16 September 1944, and grew up in the Trench Town area of Kingston. He began playing in the late 1950s, and in the 1960s performed on the Vere Johns Opportunity Hour, and in Kingston's live music scene. In 1966 he performed at the visit to Jamaica of Haile Selassie.] Herman's recording career began in 1969. He recorded as a duo with Eric "Bingy Bunny" Lamont in the early 1970s for producer Derrick Harriott, having hits in Jamaica including "Know For I" in 1971. He moved on to record for Harry Mudie in the mid-1970s. In the 1970s and 1980s he was much in demand as a studio musician, recording with The Abyssinians (including kété drums on "Satta Masa Gana", Jimmy Cliff, Prince Far I, the Congos, Culture, the Revolutionaries, Roots Radics, and Mikey Dread. He acted as percussionist for The Itals for several years.
He made an acting appearance in the 1978 film Rockers, of which he commented "Me was the first man in Jamaica to break-dance in a movie". He also features in the 2009 documentary Rock Steady the Roots of Reggae.
During the 1990s he continued to work with many of Jamaica's top stars including Beenie Man, Capleton (with whom he toured Europe in 2003/4), Sizzla, Lady Saw, and U-Roy, and in the 2000s recorded with Mutabaruka and Gyptian. The digital era proved no barrier, with Herman stating "Once yuh is a professional musician yuh will fit inna anything, even a steel band; yuh have various type a percussion fi play, yuh jus' have fi know how to mix it inna di rhythm."
His live performances often include the playing of a chamber pot and an enamel chimney.
Some highlights of his career are playing for Emperor Haile Selassie on his visit to Jamaica in 1966 and giving King Charles a one-on-one Nyabinghi drum tutorial when he was in the island in 2008.
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Official Reggae History: Prince Alla Exclusive Interview Live in Jamaica 🇯🇲 2024

Keith Blake, better known as Prince Alla, 10 May 1950, Denham Town, Kingston, Jamaica, West Indies. Prince Alla began his recording career with producer Joe Gibbs as part of the Leaders vocal group during 1967/8. Gibbs licensed three releases from the group through B&C Music in the UK before the Leaders disbanded. Blake remained with Gibbs, who produced his first solo recording, ‘Woo Oh Oh’, which, like the early Leaders recordings, was relegated to a b-side.

In 1969, he became strongly involved in the Rastafarian movement, living in the island’s camp community until the mid-70s, when he re-emerged through Bertram Brown’s Freedom Sounds with a series of records that have since proved landmarks in the history of roots music. As Prince Allah, he recorded ‘Sun Is Shining’, ‘Mama Don’t Fight’ and ‘Come Away’, all featured on the Ethiopian Kings compilation, which described him as: ‘The singer that has ability to capture the musicians, and have them play whatever he wants. A truly talented young man. With great promise for the future’. The prediction proved to be true, with classic recordings over the following years, such as ‘Bucket Bottom’, ‘Lot’s Wife’, ‘Stone’, and ‘Nah Go A Funeral’, the latter marking a reunion with Gibbs. He continued sporadically to release material throughout the late 70s and early 80s, and in 1996/7 a retrospective compilation of his Freedom Sounds work appeared through the archive label established by members of Simply Red. The release of the roots anthem ‘Born A Fighter’ demonstrated that his career was not yet over.

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