#bongo man

Bongo Man - Louise Bennett

1950

Words bending to a playful calypso sway

The Summer holidays are over, and it’s back to school time for the young ones, the not so young ones, and the young at heart. Class is in session on Oldies Sunday. Today’s selection comes from Prince Jazzbo (whose Birthday is on September 3) with the track, “School“. Produced by Sir Coxsone Dodd on the “College Rock Riddim“, and released through the Bongo Man Label in 1972, Prince Jazzbo is…

The leader of the band sang the first song of the night and the only lady of the band followed this up with a brilliant version of Dawn Penn’s “You Don’t Love Me”. And finally the legendary Jimmy Cliff walked towards his bongo with a typical Jamaican calmness. Of course “Bongo Man” was his first song and it gave me goosebumps. You have to check out the highlights on my Instagram account. He covered “Rivers of Babylon” which got stuck in my head all night. I loved the vibe of “Love song” and “Treat the youths right”. Lots of people started to whip and even some stood up at the back. It was quite fun to watch how Swiss people dance to Reggae music.

They performed another cracker “Wild World” and everyone sang to it and waved their hands. It looked great. I had a very good time! “Rebel Rebel” and “Roots Woman” made me dance.. well it made me sit dance 😀 So I was shimmying and whipping with my upper body and my legs. Maybe you’ve already done the sit dance.. If so let me know in the comments below 🙂 “Best of my Love” was next and “Vietnam” made everyone sing along again. Of course this is an important song and Jimmy Cliff changed the lyrics to Lybia, Syria, Afghanistan etc. The message was clear. Stop the War – no matter where or when!

The soundtrack “Harder they come” followed and the temperature of the sold out Volkshaus rose another few degrees. To cool down and a life lesson everyone should follow Jimmy Cliff and his band sang “Hakuna Matata” The summer feeling kept on going with “Many rivers”, “King of Kings” and “Let your yea be yea”. The uber hit “I can see clearly” was next and again the audience was in full voice. But I think the most famous song was “You can get it”. It was another highlight of mine since my Mom has been singing it to me for year. This really is a motto for you:

You can get it if you really want But you must try, try and try, try and try You’ll succeed at last

Dance time with “Reggae Night”! However I was quite disappointed that only some people stood up. Honestly this was the perfect gig to stand up and dance but since I was one of the youngest people there I guess they weren’t up for dancing… “Wonderful World” was the last song before the encore. By then we were way past the promised 9.30 finish. It seems like Jimmy Cliff liked his Swiss audience and was in for another few songs. You know other artists wait for the crowd to sing “One More” but not Jimmy Cliff. He and his band turned it into a song! I loved this! The whole crowd was singing one more and of course they gave us one or should I say two more.

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“Johnny too bad” and “Turn the table” finished this long set of amazing Reggae music by the Legend of Jimmy Cliff. I am ready for summer and I bet everyone who was at that gig is ready too. In addition to that Jimmy Cliff sent us home with the following words:

Blessed Love for All

Have you been to a Jimmy Cliff gig? Let me know and leave a reply below!

Check out my latest gigs: Nena, Sam Smith, Anastacia