Teino Evans, Staff Reporter
Lloyd Stanbury says that the Reggae Academy Awards may be able to influence the Grammys into having separate categories for dancehall and reggae. Deejay Sean Paul won a Grammy for 'Dutty Rock', while roots reggae singer, Burning Spear, took the award for 'Calling Rastafari'. - File
It is the first-ever Academy Awards to take place in Jamaica and already hundreds of artistes producers and other reggae music interests have been signing up to participate in next February's first staging.
The Reggae Academy has been established through the initiative of the Recording Industry Association of Jamaica (RIAJam), with a view to create the necessary infrastructure for the planning and presentation of the Reggae Academy Awards, an annual event geared towards the Jamaican and international reggae music communities.
The need for the academy
Winston 'Burning Spear' Rodney receives his Order Of Distinction in the rank of Officer (OD) at the Ceremony of Investiture and Presentation of National Honours and Awards 2007 at the National Indoor Sports Centre on National Heroes Day, Monday, October 15. - Ricardo Makyn/Staff Photographer
The organisers of the academy felt there was the need to create an award event to recognise and celebrate excellence in reggae, which would encompass producers, songwriters, vocalists, engineers and music video directors.
And those who applied before October 1 will be entitled to participate in the process of determining the recordings, artistes and producers that will be up for consideration in 34 proposed categories. Plans are already in high gear, as RIAJam had been encouraging practitioners in the music industry to submit their applications by then.
So far, says entertainment lawyer and member of the organising team, Lloyd Stanbury, "Just over a hundred persons made deadlines and we still have a few that we are processing."
With the many singers, song-writers, music producers, recording engineers, artiste managers, agents, radio and club DJs who have signed up so far, Stanbury says, "We have a good mix of persons - artistes, producers, young and old, managers, radio DJs. We have people represented in all categories and I don't think that any one category has outdone the other. And we have applications coming in from Barbados, Trinidad, United States, Canada, France, United Kingdom, Germany, Holland, Virgin Islands, but the majority is from Jamaica".
Stanbury says, "We have never had the Reggae Academy Awards before in Jamaica with that name and structured in this way, driven by the Recording Industry Association of Jamaica and not a private individual or entity. But we have had awards in Jamaica before. The last one I remembered we called it JAMI for Jamaica Music Industry Award, and that was several years ago. It could be as much as 10 years ago, but definitely more than five years ago".
Immediate benefits
Stanbury, chairman of the Reggae Academy, addresses the audience at the launch of the Reggae Academy and Awards at the Caribbean Business Club, New Kingston, on Monday, April 23. - Contributed
But outside of the immediate benefits of being able to participate in the awards via voting and selection process, Stanbury says there are long-term goals and benefits to membership.
"The academy is building a worldwide network with people who are involved in reggae music, so it provides a forum to disseminate information about what is happening, and could even be a lobby group. We could also even try to impact and affect how other award projects view reggae music and it gives us an opportunity to set standards," Stanbury said.
"Persons were calling for the Grammys to like have a dancehall category separate from reggae and so forth, so when we get our thing going right then maybe we can influence such situations," he said.
