World Music Index: Bob Marley

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Born: February 6, 1945
Died: May 11, 1981
Background: Bob Marley is the premier artist who took Reggae, the folk music of Jamaica, and brought it to the World. A practising Rastafari, his vision and driving belief was "One World, One Love," a them which penetrated his music. Robert Nesta Marley was the son of a white a 50-year-old quartermaster with the British West Indian Regiment and an 18 year old Jamaican girl. Though his parents were married, he rarely saw his father due to his service duties, and eventually settled with his mother in Trenchtown, a place immortalized in his classic song "No Woman, No Cry." After quitting school, Bob formed The Wailing Wailers (later re-formed as "The Wailers") eventually got signed with Island Records, a label which began as a Reggae-oriented company but later embraced white rock music from the likes of King Crimson and Jethro Tull. In the early 1970's, The Wailers put out some legendary tunes such as "Get Up, Stand Up" and "I Shot the Sheriff," which is best-known in its cover version by Eric Clapton. For the rest of the decade Marley toured, recorded and remained spiritual and political. He died of cancer at the age of 36, but his music and legend lives on through his devout fans and his son Ziggy, who has taken on the family's musical flame.