Black Music Month goes back to its Reggae-Dancehall roots on Saturday, June 4, 2011, with a unique fundraising dance and culturama in aid of the establishment of a Marcus Garvey Self Sufficiency Center in Fort Lauderdale.
Music lovers and party goers are in for a special treat when three noted selectors come together for the “Triple Word Sound & Power Musical Explosion”, scheduled for the Greynolds Park Camp Ground at 18601 NE 22nd Avenue in North Miami Beach starting at 9.00 pm.
Twinsound for Black Music Month show for Garvey Center.
Yvette “Sistah Liveth” Marshall and Lalibela Muzik is the first third of the sound system trinity involved in the Greynolds Park culturama. The popular female selector is one of the leading sound system personalities in South Florida and her Lalibela Muzik sound system is known for playing conscious roots music while remaining relevant to the popular trends in today’s music industry.
Yvette was born in New Jersey to a former Jamaican DJ living in the United States. One of her favorite pastimes as a child was accompanying her father, “Sir Charles” from Sir Charles Hi Fi, to music stores to help him find records. Yvette was always fascinated with the sound system as a child and knew she would play some kind of role in music one day.
Today she has fulfilled her pedigree and her dreams and plays a conscious mix of positive and party music on the South Florida nightlife circuit as well as on the radio.
Yvette "Sistah Liveth" Marshall
In the middle of the sound system explosion is New York City’s Majestic Twin Sounds, represented by energetic twin brothers Ras Kehinde and Ras Tayo. Combing aspects of their parents’ Haitian culture with aspects of the Jamaican culture they experienced growing up in Brooklyn, the brothers have established themselves as leading cultural selectors on the northeast roots music scene –from Philadelphia, to New Jersey, throughout New York, to Connecticut, to Boston.
Alternating and doubling as both selectors and Dee Jays, the Twinsound brothers have been spinning music in and around NYC for the past fifteen plus years, and have played at most major events for almost every artist under the Reggae banner. Including the dub plate specials and one-away tracks recorded at their “Ghetto Roots” studio in Brooklyn, the twins boast a formidable arsenal of selections, ranging from vintage and Ska, to foundation Rock Steady and Studio 1, to instrumental versions and King Tubby styled dubs, to roots & culture Reggae and Old School Message Music, to conscious New School Dancehall.
The third note of the musical trinity performing at the Garvey Center fundraising dance session is Ivor “Livety” Gordon and his Livety Sound. He is a seasoned veteran of Old-School Roots & Culture music and is a protégé of Dancehall Dean, Brigadier Jerry. Ivor therefore patterns his style of selecting tracks on that of the renown Jahlove Muzik sound system.
In 1974 while in school, Ivor became involved with the sound system world because of other influences around him like Micheal Rose, Ranking Trevor, Ranking Joe, Earl Sixteen, Winston Mc Anuff, Hopeton Lindo, Dennis Brown, Wayne Wade and General Jah Mikey.
Ivor “Livety” Gordon and his Livety Sound.
Ivor hails from Cassia Park in St Andrew, Jamaica and presently resides in South Florida where Livety Sounds is based. He has been a sound system DJ/Selector since 1974, a recording engineer since 1990 and is contributing positive music to inspire and educate the listening audience through his sound system and studio productions.Besides this trinity of music selectors, patrons attending the Marcus Garvey Center fundraiser will also be entertained by guest artists including Pressure, Screwdriver, Ambilique, Satta (Abyssinians) and Pablove Black, who are only some of those who have agreed to make live guest appearances toasting or playing on the sound system microphones.
The project to establish a Marcus Garvey Self-Sufficiency Center is providing practical, real-world, real-time, sustainable, community-based solutions to pending or potential environmental and/or social emergencies facing the Pan African Diaspora in South Florida.
Spearheaded by the non-profit Rootz Foundation Inc., the Marcus Garvey Self-Sufficiency Center project is a two-part venture: part one entails acquiring land for a Cooperative Community Farm, and part two entails establishing an eco-friendly Self-Sufficiency Community Center in the metro Fort Lauderdale area. When completed, the Marcus Garvey Self-Sufficiency Center will be the community-based home of Self-Sufficiency, Disaster Preparation and Environmental Awareness for adults.
The multi-purpose center will also house a 21st Century Survival School teaching our at-risk Black children the new skill sets required for sustainable living in today’s world.
About Mark Lee
Mark Lee has been a long-time journalist writing, editing and producing in print, radio television and new media.