Jamaica's National Beat: A Look at the Evolution of Style
Through the Drumming of Lloyd Knibb

The British colony of Jamaica became an independent commonwealth on August 6, 
1962. That same year Jamaica's music industry liberated itself from American 
popular music with the emergence of a new music genre known as ska. Like other 
Jamaican popular music genres before its inception, ska was a composite of many 
musical elements traceable to external influence. Unlike those earlier genres, 
ska became a distinctly Jamaican form due to several subtle changes in 
performance, most notably a shift in the phrasing of the drum pattern heralded 
by drummer Lloyd Knibb.

In this article I will examine Lloyd Knibb's original contributions to ska 
drumming and their effect on reggae as a whole, through excerpts from an 
interview I conducted with Knibb, musical examples and transcriptions. 
Furthermore, I will discuss the external musical influences that were an 
integral part of Knibb's musical statement. In the process, I hope to provide a 
picture of Knibb's pivotal role in the development of reggae music and the 
continuing influence of his work today.

Introduction

Outside the island of Jamaica reggae music is all but defined by a single 
image: Bob Marley, Rastafarian dreadlocks hanging over his guitar, lips parted 
in song, ganja spliff in hand. With the help of British producers, Bob Marley's 
spiritual lyrics, anvil-heavy rhythms and soccer inspired dance steps became 
the visage of reggae worldwide. But reggae's roots are not so mystical; the 
earliest recordings are inspired by American big band and rhythm and blues 
music. More than a decade before reggae defined itself as a vehicle for social 
statement most Jamaican records were knock-offs of American chart toppers, from 
the record sleeve to the sounds on the vinyl. Even the iconic Bob Marley's 
earliest recordings feature oddities such as a cover of "Teenager in Love," 
originally recorded by New York Doo-Woppers Dion and The Belmonts. Despite this 
inauspicious beginning, the Jamaican recording industry unearthed its voice in 
the early 1960's with ska.

Drummer Lloyd Knibb, a key player in reggae's formative days and self 
proclaimed creator of the "ska beat," is arguably the father of all reggae 
drumset playing thereafter. After working for 15 years in jazz and dance bands 
in Montego Bay, home of Jamaica's booming hotel scene, Knibb relocated to 
Kingston in 1962, where Jamaica's new recording industry was emerging. Knibb 
quickly found work at Studio One recording for Coxsone Dodd, a producer of 
Jamaican "Boogie" music. Dodd, who operated a soundsystem in addition to his 
recording studio, desired cutting edge sounds that would distinguish his 
recordings from other producers and operators thus he encouraged his musicians 
to experiment with new ideas. The resulting sounds, which became known as 
"ska," heralded the birth of a creative music scene that flourishes today.

From 1962 to 1965 Knibb was the house drummer at Studio One with his band The 
Skatalites. In addition to their instrumental recordings, The Skatalites backed 
virtually every vocalist to record in this period including some who went on to 
become legends, such as Toots Hibberts, Delroy Wilson, Alton Ellis, John Holt, 
Price Buster and Bob Marley. In 1965 The Skatalites amazing run ended just as 
quickly as it had begun and Knibb returned to Montego Bay where he performed in 
hotels and on cruise ships until the reassembled Skatalites beckoned him to the 
U.S. in the early 80s. At 78 years old Knibb is still an active musician, 
recording and touring internationally with The Skatalites.

I met with Lloyd Knibb at his home in Hull, MA and asked him about his role in 
the fledgling moments of reggae history.

Jamaica's national beat

BC: Did you set out to change the role of the drums or did it happen naturally?

LK: It happened just natural, it was a natural thing. I was in the studio 
playing the same oom-cha oom-cha oom-cha (sings an R&B shuffle rhythm) thing 
when Coxsone, Downbeat said to me, he said: "Lloyd, I want to change the beat." 
So I remember now I used to play Dean Frasier's band doing a lot of Latin tunes 
doing a lot of different different kind of tunes, so I said "alright then" and 
I come up with the second and fourth beat, and that was it. That was it. Used 
to be Drumbago (another studio drummer), and I was in Montego Bay at those 
times, when I hear those shuffle things, so I leave my job and go to Kingston, 
went to Kingston, Coxsone and I changed the beat, and from that, Drumbago was 
out . I worked with everyone, Duke Reid, Prince Buster, you name it, I take 
over the whole thing. Sometimes I have 3 sessions in a day.

Knibb's reference to "the second and fourth beat" regards his principle 
contribution to Jamaican music, the "one-drop" beat. Although not so-named 
until several years later, Lloyd's beat is essentially the same and undeniably 
the source of the one-drop. Prior to Knibb Jamaican drummers were emulating the 
shuffle style of American popular music, as is evidenced on "Judge Not" 
(Transcription 1), from Bob Marley's first recording session in 1962. But as 
reggae scholar David Katz notes, "Ska differed from Boogie mainly in the accent 
of its beat." Recorded just one year later in 1963, Marley's first number one 
hit "Simmer Down" (Transcription 2) is not only an archetypal example of 
Knibb's drumming contribution; the recording shows the codifying effect of his 
new approach on the band as a whole. Knibb shifted emphasis away from beats one 
and three by leaving out the bass drum while adding an accented cross-stick and 
bass drum combination on beats two and four, creating a strong and clear 
downbeat. The horns and guitar play on the "and" of each beat, centering 
Lloyd's "drop" squarely on beats two and four.

Knibb's simple but energetic groove adds heft and importance to the repetitive 
patterns of the horns and guitar by allowing them to fill an empty rhythmic 
space. Each instrument now has a more defined role and a part that "locks" into 
the spaces within the other musicians' parts. This new structure, which has 
continued to be an integral part of reggae and is similar to the rhythmic 
formula that would later help define funk music, "tightens up" the band's sound 
by applying strict rhythmic patterns to the harmonic and chordal instruments as 
well as the drums. This tighter sound allows the singers and the horn soloists 
to both extend the shape of and use more rhythmic freedom in the phrasing of 
their melodic lines. The feeling that this creates - a longer melody soaring 
above a shorter repetitive rhythm section vamp - would remain a major 
compositional component of reggae for the next twenty years.

Out of many sounds, one

BC: Before you landed in Coxsone's studio in Kingston what music were you 
inspired by?

LK: Jazz, Jazz, Jazz, Jazz

BC: Who were the Jazz drummers and musicians you were listening to?

LK: You name the big bands - all of those big bands we used to hear. Cab 
Calloway, Teddy Heath, Count Basie, Glenn Miller, all those tunes. We used to 
play them in the hotels because we're starting at the hotels playing waltz and 
foxtrot and boleros and in Dean (Frasier)'s band you know we played a lot of 
Cha Cha and bolero - lot of Latin so I have that in my brain and I put it in 
the ska beat and it match. You listen to it and it matches with what's 
happening.

BC: I hear a strong "and" of four accent in some of your beats, is that where 
it came from - it sounds to me almost like a conga part (sings conga part).

LK: Yes. Yes ya know, that's right. Certain times the feeling of what I do has 
that kind of Latin feeling with the beat.

Knibb's work in the hotels of Montego Bay had a profound effect on his drumming 
on early ska recordings. In addition to the obvious jazz influence, Lloyd's 
original beats are thick with the sound of "dance band" Latin drumset patterns 
of the 1940's and 50's. These grooves, such as the foxtrot, mambo, bolero and 
rumba, were the essence of a whole percussion section boiled down to the parts 
that could be represented by one man on a drumset. These rhythms were also 
incorporated into American jazz music of the time. John Riley, jazz drumming 
historian notes: "The mambo craze of the 1950s influenced drummers such as Max 
Roach and Art Blakey, who adapted the rhythm and feel of the mambo to the bop 
rhythms of their time. Their mambo pattern was a bit more rounded and 
improvised than the traditional mambo and could be played with either a 
straight eighth-note or swing feel." Knibb would have been performing these 
rhythms in a somewhat strict setting for dancers in hotels while also listening 
to them loosely interpreted on the albums of the American jazz musicians by 
whom he was inspired.

In addition to his North American influences, Knibb absorbed a host of sounds 
from the Caribbean. Calypso musicians from Trinidad toured through Jamaica and 
often stayed for extended periods of time, frequently using Jamaican musicians 
to fill out their bands. Before the ready availability of recordings from the 
U.S. mento, which Stolzoff refers to as "a creolized version of European- and 
African- derived styles," had been Jamaica's dance music of choice. Although 
less popular, mento persisted and along with calypso became part of the 
menagerie of styles performed by hotel musicians. Furthermore, Knibb and other 
Kingston musicians frequented the Rastafarian burru drumming jams hosted by 
Count Ossie. Burru drumming, whose practitioners Stolzoff argue "propagated the 
drumming traditions of their West African Asante ancestors," was gradually 
integrated into Jamaican popular culture with ska. Therefore at Studio One 
Knibb was in essence doing what Art Blakey and Max Roach had done before him - 
sculpting the sounds and ideas of external influence into sounds that were 
intrinsically his own. As Knibb said to me, "I put everything in the ska 
music."

For example, on the recording of John Holt's "Rum Bumpers," (Transcription 3) 
Knibb frequently augments the "and" of two or four with a strong bass drum 
accent. This creates a sound similar to the conga part, or in a drumset 
adaptation the tom-tom, of a mambo (Transcription 4) , a rhythm Lloyd would 
have played nightly in Montego Bay. On Don Drummond's "Chinatown" 
(Transcription 5) Knibb plays the same pattern but shifts the sidestick from 
the four to the "and" of three and four, much like the sidestick pattern in the 
drumset application of a bolero.

Another characteristic of Knibb's in this era is his straight 8th note phrasing 
on the hi hat and ride cymbals. On both "Rum Bumpers" and Bob Marley's "One 
Love" (Transcription 6), Knibb plays a busy cymbal pattern with a straight 8th 
note pulse reminiscent of the type of pattern played for almost any Latin 
tinged jazz composition. By pulling the rhythm section towards a pulse without 
a shuffle, Knibb created a sense of forward motion in the music. The effect was 
similar to that of be bop jazz but with the added potential for commercial 
success; the music was often blazingly fast with flamboyant solos, but the 
rhythms were strong and repetitive enough to inspire dancing.
Lessons within an oral tradition

BC: How did you learn to play drums, did you take lessons?

LK: I was self-taught. I used to live at West Street, and they had a big band 
practicing on Beacon Street and Donald Jarrett was playing drums. So I used to 
go and sit down with Donald Jarrett and listen to him and watch him and things. 
So after rehearsal finished I would go over to my yard and I take up a pan and 
a box - the box was the bass drum and I would bang my foot, my heel, on the box 
and the pan was the snare drum. So I started at Coney Island. We used to have a 
place called Coney Island, where people come and gamble, all kinds of gambling 
throw dice and gamble and it closed up by 10 o'clock, all the gambling was 
finished. I used to go there after and get my practice at Coney Island. Until 
after a friend, Gabriel, was listening to me, a trumpeter and he said, "Lloyd, 
Val Bennett needs a drummer and it only you I think can fill the space." And I 
went into his band. We played a lot of Cab Calloway tunes, Tiny Davis, Louis 
Jordan and stuff. And then that band break up and I joined Dean (Frasier)'s 
band.

BC: I recently saw a major music publication cite Carlton Barrett as the 
inventor of the one-drop style.

LK: No, man! (Laughs) Carly Barrett and um, Sly… Sly (Dunbar) used to come down 
around Beaumont and sit on the bandstand when he was a boy with me. All of them 
know it (the reggae drumming style) from me. Carly used to set up my drums… He 
set up my drums all the time.

Bob Marley, Bob Marley just came in the studio, he didn't know how to count and 
he come in sometime and come in different - he'd change the key. I said "Bob, 
this not the key no more, they change the key, you're coming in wrong, you're 
out of key." Sometimes when the horns solo and they (the singers) are coming 
back they don't know when to come in. So I said "all right, I will cue you and 
that's all you get, that 8 bars or 12 and then that would bring the vocalist 
in," so he'd know. So after that, Toots and everybody, you name them, all the 
vocalists that you hear about now passed through my hands. We did twenty tunes 
a day sometimes. Sometimes in Coxsone's studio we went in at about 10 o'clock 
in the morning and we didn't come out until about 5 o'clock in the next 
morning. So cook and eat and go back to work again.

Despite the fact that it was available in some schools , many young people, 
Knibb included, had no access to musical training. Because of the lack of 
formal teachers, the method of learning music for most was to watch, listen and 
then go home and try it oneself. As Jeff Titon points out in his writing on 
another music with an oral tradition, American Blues, "Unquestionably the best 
way to come to know a song is to make it your own by performing it." Knibb 
learned to play drums by literally sitting at the feet of an older musician and 
then imitating what he had heard. This being said, it is certainly fathomable 
that Carlton Barrett, a twelve year old boy when Knibb first dropped his 
signature sidestick and bass drum combination on Coxsone Dodd's acetate, 
carried and set up Knibb's drums and learned to play drums by copying what he 
witnessed in those sessions.

The significance of Knibb's Skatalites era drumming is discernable throughout 
reggae recordings of the ensuing decades. Drummers such as Sly Dunbar, who by 
his own estimation has performed on the majority of reggae ever recorded , and 
Carlton Barrett cite Knibb's work as their primary influence. Although Knibb 
crafted the ska beat, and reggae is defined by the one-drop rhythm, the 
variance between the two is essentially in their pace. As singer Derrick 
Harriott notes, rocksteady, the style that chased ska from eminence, was 
created by "slow(ing) the beat down to about half the tempo of ska."
For instance, a comparison of the transcribed drum rhythm of "Simmer Down" 
(transcription 2), with that of "None Shall Escape the Judgement" 
(transcription 7), a 1975 Johnny Clarke recording that post dates Simmer Down 
by thirteen years, reveals the two rhythms to be identical. While on paper the 
rhythms are twins, aurally they are father and son, the contrast existing in 
their tempo and rhythmic inflection. Knibb's influence is again perceptible 
twenty seven years later, this time within a programmed drum machine part, on 
Sizzla's 2002 recording of "Trod On" (transcription 8). The rhythm is again 
slower but the central focal point remains the "drop" on beats two and four.

Conclusion

Lloyd Bradley states that "it was the excitement and adventure presented by ska 
that established the Jamaican music industry." Forty years later ska is not 
popular music in Jamaica and one can safely assume that to the young people of 
the island it sounds like "oldies." Nonetheless ska remains a powerful force in 
that it is the foundation on which reggae was built. Rocksteady and reggae 
would not exist without their distinctive rhythms that are based on Knibb's ska 
beat. With its assimilation of a multitude of influences ska set a precedent 
that continues in the present day. In the same manner ska utilized jazz, Latin 
and R&B, rocksteady employed soul, reggae integrated rock n' roll and dancehall 
blends with rap and hip-hop. As the Jamaican recording industry's first unique 
offering ska demonstrated that more could be achieved than reproduction of 
American music and that original music from the island had value.



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from Rumba to Reggae (Philidelphia: Temple University Press, 1995), 143-82

Bradley, Lloyd, Reggae: The Story of Jamaican Music (BBC Worldwide, 2002)

Katz, David, Solid Foundation: An Oral History of Reggae, (New York: 
Bloomsbury, 2003)

Riley, John, and Thress, Dan (ed.), The Art of Bop Drumming, (Manhattan Music 
Inc., 1994)

Stolzoff, Norman, Wake the Town and Tell the People: Dancehall Culture in 
Jamaica (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2000)

Titon, Jeff Todd, North America/Black America, Jeff Todd Titon, ed., Worlds of 
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Bob Marley.com, The Story of The Wailers: A Tribute to Carlton Barrett, 
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Van Pelt, Carter, Slyght of Hand, 
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Discography

Gillespie, Dizzy, Dizzy Gillespie at Newport (Verve/Polygram, 1992)

Kalonji, Sizzla, Blaze Up The Chalwa, (King of Kings/Jet Star, 2002)

Marley, Bob, Simmer Down at Studio One, Vol. 1 (Heartbeat/PGD, 1994)

Marley, Bob, Songs of Freedom, (Island/Def Jam Music Group, 1999)

Various Artists, Dub: More Bass Culture, (Metro/Union Square Music, 2002)

Various Artists, Skatalites and Friends at Randy's, (V.P. Records, 1998)

Various Artists, Trojan Ska Box Set, (Trojan Records, 1998)