(Jamaica Observer) Ariwa Records, the independent label of Guyana-born music producer Neil ‘Mad Professor’ Fraser, will celebrate its 30th anniversary in January with the Back To Africa Music Festival in The Gambia.
The six-day event is scheduled for January 20-25 in the city of Butukunku.
It features many of the performers who helped Ariwa become one of the biggest reggae labels in the United Kingdom.
A protégé of Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, Fraser is known throughout Europe and parts of the United States for his dub productions. In England, reggae fans are familiar with him as one of the leading producers of lovers rock reggae.
The eccentric Perry and Aswad lead singer Brinsley Forde are expected to headline ‘Back To Africa’. They will be accompanied by several of Ariwa’s most successful artistes such as Brown Sugar, Sandra Cross, John McLean, Tippa Irie and Levi Roots.
Levi Roots, who has become a multi-millionaire as the man behind the popular Reggae Reggae Sauce, was recently in Jamaica promoting his products.
Back To Africa will not be all music. There will be panel discussions, a seminar and a Miss Natural beauty contest. Disc jockey Steve James of Bess FM, an authority on British reggae, is to be one of the participants in the festival.
James has been involved with Fraser and his label since its early days.
“Some of the biggest lovers rock music and singers came out of Ariwa.
That’s what really broke the label,” James said.
Time For Love by McLean and Sandra Cross’ Country Living are two of Ariwa’s biggest selling songs. Dread A Who She Love by Macka B and Kofi is maybe the label’s best known song in Jamaica.
Fraser was born in the Guyana capital, Georgetown, but immigrated to the UK when he was 13. It was here that he developed a love for Jamaican music, especially the dub sounds of Perry and Osbourne ‘King Tubby’ Ruddock.
Fraser established Ariwa in 1979. The label was prolific throughout the 1990s when it signed a distribution deal with Washington DC-based RAS
Records to distribute its music in the US. Fraser has worked with some of the biggest names in reggae including Bob Andy and Horace Andy.
One of his latest productions, “London Burning” by Big Youth, has been doing well on the UK reggae scene.
