BTEC Music Tech Award - Reggae

Component 1

'Is all music the same?'

Reggae

reggae | Definition, History, Artists, & Factsreggae, style of popular music that originated in Jamaica in the late 1960s and quickly emerged as the country’s dominant music. By the 1970s it had become an international style that was particularly popular in Britain, the United States, and Africa. It was widely perceived as a voice of the oppressed. According to an early definition in The Dictionary of Jamaican English (1980), reggae is based on ska, an earlier form of Jamaican popular music, and employs a heavy four-beat rhythm driven by drums, bass guitar, electric guitar, and the “scraper,” a corrugated stick that is rubbed by a plain

Artists: Toots and the Maytals , The Wailers, Peter Tosh, Bob Marley, Jimmy Cliff... (shown below left to right)

Basic Stylistic Features

time signature of 4/4, with heavy accent placed on the 2nd and 4th beats of the bar

2. strophic form

a repeated verse and chorus

3. typical rock line up

vocals, backing vocals, electric guitars, bass guitar and drum kit

4. prominent riff played on bass guitar

5. simple chord sequences

6. reference to Rastafari

a religion which emerged in Jamaica in the 1930s

More Reading/Listening Links

Toots & the Maytals (YouTube)

The Wailers (YouTube)

Bob Marley (YouTube)

Jimmy Cliff (YouTube)

BBC Bitesize - Reggae

Five Core Elements of Reggae

List of Videos and Songs used in Class...

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