Derrick Morgan
(born 27 March 1940)
King of SKA
Colossal contributor to the development of Jamaican popular music.
Derrick Morgan’s contribution to Jamaican music is immense. His achievements become even more amazing when one considers that he did most of these things while blind. In 1960 he was the only artist ever to fill the places from one to seven on the Jamaican pop chart simultaneously. music exploits continued in 1998, 2000, and 2002, when he wrote three winning Festival Competition songs – Jamaica Whoa (performed by Neville Martin), Fi Wi Island a Boom (performed by Stanley Beckford), and Progress (performed by Devon Black), respectively.
He is a Jamaican musical artist who was popular in the 1960s and 1970s. He worked with Desmond Dekker, Bob Marley, and Jimmy Cliff in the rhythm and blues and ska genres, and he also performed rocksteady and skinhead reggae.
In 1957, Morgan entered the Vere Johns Opportunity Hour, a talent show held at the Palace Theatre in Kingston.[citation needed] He won with rousing impressions of Little Richard and, shortly after that, was recruited to perform around the island with the popular Jamaican comedy team Bim and Bam.[citation needed]
In 1959, Morgan entered the recording studio for the first time. Duke Reid, the sound system boss, was looking for talent to record for his Treasure Isle record label Morgan cut two popular shuffle-boogie sides “Lover Boy”, a.k.a. “S-Corner Rock”, and “Oh My”.[citation needed] Soon after, Morgan cut the bolero-tinged boogie “Fat Man”, which also became a hit He also found time to record for Coxsone Dodd.[citation needed]
In 1960 Morgan became the only artist ever to fill the places from one to seven on the Jamaican pop chart simultaneously. Among those hits were “Don’t Call Me Daddy”, “In My Heart”, “Be Still”, and “Meekly Wait and Murmur Not”. But it was the following year that Morgan released the biggest hit of his career, the Leslie Kong production of “Don’t You Know”, later retitled “Housewives’ Choice” by a local DJ. The song featured a bouncing ska riddim, along with a duet by Morgan and Millicent “Patsy” Todd.[citation needed]
“Housewives’ Choice” began the rivalry between Morgan and Prince Buster, who accused Morgan of stealing his ideas. Buster quickly released “Blackhead Chiney Man”, chiding Morgan with the sarcastic put-down “I did not know your parents were from Hong Kong” – a swipe at Kong. Morgan returned with the classic “Blazing Fire”, in which he warns Buster to “Live and let others live, and your days will be much longer. You said it. Now it’s the Blazing Fire”. Buster shot back with, “Watch It Blackhead”, which Morgan countered with “No Raise No Praise” and “Still Insist”.[citation needed] Followers of the two artists often clashed, and eventually, the government had to step in with a staged photo shoot depicting the rivals as friends.[citation needed]
Morgan had a major success in 1962 with “Forward March”, a song celebrating Jamaican independence from Great Britain.
“I’m not political. But I am a man who used to write songs about what I heard about, what’s going on around me. When I heard about the two leaders of Jamaica — which was Alexander Bustamante and Norman Manley — went to bat for the independence and they get through, I said ‘I should write a song,’” Morgan remembers, adding that “Forward March” was recorded in one take at Federal Studios with a cast of now-fabled session players.
In the mid-1960s, when ska evolved into rocksteady, Morgan continued to release top-quality material, including the seminal rude boy songs, “Tougher Than Tough”, “Do the Beng Beng”, “Conquering Ruler”, and a cover of Ben E. King’s soul hit, “Seven Letters”. Produced by Bunny Lee, “Seven Letters” is often cited as the first true reggae single. In 1969 Morgan recorded the skinhead anthem “Moon Hop” (on Crab Records). However, failing eyesight then forced him to give up regular stage appearances. Morgan still performs occasionally at ska revival shows across the world – often backed by the guitarist Lynn Taitt. He remained popular in Jamaica and the UK into the early 1970s and has lived primarily in the UK or the US since the late 1960s.
With reggae music’s significant popularity of reggae in the UK in the late 1960s and early 1970s, British reggae label Trojan Records created a subsidiary, Song Bird, to issue Morgan’s productions. The label issued 75 singles between 1969 and 1973.
Morgan has written several songs that have won the Festival Song Contest for other artists, including “Jamaica Whoa” (1998, Neville Martin), “Fi Wi Island A Boom” (2000, Stanley Beckford), and “Progress” (2002, Devon Black).
In July 2002 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, a two-night “Legends of Ska” concert was held. Reuniting were The Skatalites, Lloyd Knibb, Rico Rodriguez, Lloyd Brevett, Lester Sterling, Johnny Moore, and Lynn Taitt; along with Prince Buster, Alton Ellis, Owen Gray, Lord Creator, Justin Hinds, Derrick Harriott, Winston Samuels, Roy Wilson, Patsy Todd, Doreen Shaffer, Stranger Cole, Lord Tanamo, and Derrick Morgan. In 2007, Morgan appeared on the bill at the annual Augustibuller music festival. His song “Tougher Than Tough” was featured in the video game Scarface: The World is Yours.
Morgan retired from the music industry because of illness in the 2010s, but returned in 2016 to collaborate with Kirk Diamond on a remake of Morgan’s song 1960s “Conqueror”.
Morgan headlined the Supernova International Ska Festival, in Fredericksburg, Virginia from May 27 to 28, 2017