Tomorrow’s Warriors presents: The Reggae Ticket – an exciting community music and culture outreach programme that takes to the road across seven UK cities, alongside Gary Crosby’s popular heritage reggae tour, The Trojan Story performed by the 22-piece Jazz Jamaica All Stars.
Supported by Arts Council England, The Reggae Ticket launched during October 2019 Black History Month and builds on The Trojan Story and takes it to secondary school age children, community choirs and ensembles. The opportunity to enjoy, celebrate and learn about the music, culture and heritage of the iconic Trojan Records label is shared across generations.
Due to the government actions taken in response to Coronavirus, The Reggae Ticket was suspended, just before the young people we were working with in Manchester and Liverpool were able to join Jazz Jamaica All Stars in performance on March 27th and 28th.
While we reschedule the outstanding Trojan Story shows, we hope that as many of the young people who have already worked with us will be able to join us on the new dates, to be confirmed shortly.
Meanwhile, read on as we present some of the extra special highlights and content from The Reggae Ticket , including the Trojan Story exhibition and a short ‘How to play reggae’ tutorial video from Jazz Jamaica.
To accompany the Trojan Story concert, we created an exhibition to tell the story of Trojan Records through record sleeves, press clippings, photographs and text, we can but scratch the surface of the music, the people and the creativity that has been transforming the British music scene since the early 1960s. The exhibition aims to inspire further exploration of all things Trojan, in particular the artists and of course, the music.
An important part of The Reggae Ticket was our oral history project to record people’s memories of Trojan Records and how reggae music impacted their lives. We interviewed people in Birmingham, Bristol and Manchester asking them what Trojan Records meant to them.
As the second largest city in the UK, Birmingham had a huge part to play in the story of Reggae and the music of Trojan records. Sound systems and record shops proliferated, creating a vital music scene that provided the backdrop for young people growing up in racially challenging 1960’s Birmingham. Thanks to all members of THSH Reggae choir and Notebenders who shared their stories with us in October 2019. THSH Reggae Choir: Linda Bowen, Glynis Hulin, Darrell Taylor, Jannette Barrett, Dean Lawrence, Zonia Anderson- Bell, Geraldine Malcolm. Notebenders: Paul Reynolds, Trevor Huggins, Alex di Maio, Fred Webb, Janis Pryce, Dionne Curd, Dennis Hepburn.
We met our two interviewees Merle Williams and Richard Young at an African Caribbean day centre in Claremont resource centre, Hulme. They shared their interesting personal stories of reggae music and how it provided them with a sense of identity, helping them feel at home in areas that could be hostile to black people, as well as changing some people’s perceptions in parts of the UK where there were few black people. Thanks to all the resource centre staff and Band on the Wall for their support with this project.
Here is some video footage and images from the Jazz Jamaica All Stars show and The Reggae Ticket activities in Birmingham, Bristol, Manchester and Liverpool.
We look forward to seeing you at one of the re scheduled shows around the UK. Watch this space for the announcement of the full line-up and programme for The Trojan Story and The Reggae Ticket at The Royal Festival Hall taking place on Sunday July 18th 2021.
Ensembles from Harrow and Brent will perform on the Riverside Terrace, in the early afternoon of Sunday 18th July.
Links
• Bass Culture Research at The University of Westminster
Books about the subject
• London is Calling by Caspar Melville
• Bass Culture by Lloyd Bradley
• Sounds like London by Lloyd Bradley