May 11, 2020
Peter Ashbourne returns to talk about some key players in, and clear up some misconceptions around the Jamaican Popular Music timeline. We spoke for almost 2 hours, so this will be Part 1 of 2 episodes. The second part, (Episode 15) will be published in 2 weeks. This is Mike’s Moment Of… Reggae History Part 1.
Peter was previously featured in Episode 5, Music Technology: A Jamaican Story
Listen here:
among other places.
Peter Ashbourne attended the St. Hugh’s Preparatory School, the
Wolmer’s High School for Boys, the University of the West Indies in
Kingston, the Jamaica School of Music, and has a Bachelor of Music
(composition) degree from the Berklee College of Music (Boston,
Mass., USA). Mr Ashbourne, who holds a LRSM (Performance)
diploma in violin, was considered a child prodigy on that
instrument from as early as age 9. He also plays the
piano.
An experienced composer, arranger, performer and band leader,
Ashbourne taught at the ‘Jamaica School of Music’ in its Jazz
Department from 1976 – 1979. He conducted an Art Music and Reggae
Workshop at the ‘University of Music and Dramatic Arts – Graz’,
Austria in 1986 and held a lecture and seminar on the ‘Development
of Jamaican Popular Music, from Mento, Ska, Reggae to
Dancehall’ at the ‘University of Southern Maine’, U.S.A.,
in spring 2007. His lecture ‘Two Turning Points in Jamaican
Popular Music’ held at the Global Reggae Conference 2008,
at the University of the West Indies (UWI) was universally
well received and was published in the Book ‘Global Reggae’ in
2013. In 2019 he was invited to present ‘An Overview of Jamaica’s
Musical Landscape’ at the annual UWI ‘Philip Sherlock Lecture’.
For more information, please check out his website:
www.peterashbourne.com