Burning Spear

Winston Rodney's destiny appeared set after he met another famous son of Saint Ann, Jamaica - Bob Marley - in 1969. Marley introduced him to the famous reggae producer Clement Dodd and Rodney put together a band, adopting the name Burning Spear from Kenya's first president, Jomyo Kenyatta. The group recorded a series of singles in Dodd's studio but their big breakthrough came in 1975 after teaming up with Jack Ruby on the Marcus Garvey album, inspired by the Rastafarian prophet. It turned them into one of Jamaica's most important reggae groups and secured a major label deal with Island Records. But the following year Rodney split to go solo, retaining the name Burning Spear for subsequent releases; which included Dry & Heavy (1977) and Social Living (1978), featuring Aswad as his backing band. He continued to be one of reggae's most influential figures with a series of albums through the 1980s, including the Grammy-nominated Resistance (1985), and maintained his popularity with regular tours in the 1990s when he gained complete artistic control. In 2000 Rodney received his first Grammy Award for Calling Rastafari, repeating the honour in 2009 with the Jah Is Real album.