Dance Band Highlife I

Dance Band Highlife I

• Sierra Leone
  • Old Boy Association Groups
  • 1934 - Freetown Rediffusion Service
  • 1935 - BBC Overseas Service
  • 1940’s Freetown Busiest Seaport
  • 1950’s Ticklers, Tejan-Sie’s Sierra Leone Police Band
  • 1955 Sierra Leone Broadcasting Service
  • 1960’s Congolese group Ryko Jazz

Notes:

Ballroom Dance Band - Bourgeois elite - tickets a weeks wages ( Seven shillings and sixpence ), evening dress, champagne, hotels. Sierra Leonne

• Old Boy Association Groups Cuban Swing Band, Mayfair Dance Band
• 1934 - Freetown Rediffusion Service
  • Sir Arnold Hodson “ the Sunshine Governor”
  • 2pounds and 12 shillings
  • Broadcast full spectrum of music
  • “Variety Time” hosted by Ralph Wright and his “Radio Discoveries”
  • Called Kongosa Boxes which in Krio means gossip,
• 1935 - BBC Overseas Service- Shellac discs of local Temne and Mende musicians
• 1940’s Freetown Busiest Seaport
• 1950’s Ticklers, Tejan-Sie’s Sierra Leone Police Band
• 1955 Sierra Leone Broadcasting Service
  • Began a local record library in 1986 had 716 Shellac discs
  • Large number of guitar discs from Zaire particularly Mwenda Jean Bosco
• 1960’s Congolese group Ryko Jazz - influenced musicians
  • Cisco Kids
  • Afro National
  • Super Combo
  • Gerald Pine formed Geraldo Pino and the Heartbeats ( big influence on Fela Kuti - Afrobeat Sound )
• Early 1960’s British R&B scene Bunny Mack
• 1981 Let Me Love You