As a budding musician within the Nineteen Sixties, Willie Stewart backed Ken Boothe in what was one among his first huge gigs. On April 26-27, the veteran drummer will direct a band on his Rhythms OF Africa present, which salutes the influential singer.
Boothe, who turns 77 on March 22, is likely one of the performers for the favored occasion which Stewart has staged in South Florida since 2010. The 2 reveals happen at Miramar Cultural Middle.
“My reminiscences of working with Ken goes again to once I was 16, the youngest member of Byron Lee and the Dragonaires at Carib Theatre. The honour to again up Ken on stage as a drummer was like a sense of pleasure, an ideal achievement,” Stewart recalled.
That present passed off in the course of the late Nineteen Sixties when Boothe was hitting his stride as an artiste, due to hit songs like Puppet On A String, Simply One other Lady and Say You. Stewart, born in London, joined The Dragonaires whereas nonetheless at Wolmer’s Boys’ Excessive College.
Willie Stewart and Alison Hinds on the 2024 Rhythms Of Africa present in Miramar, South Florida.
Though Boothe was only a few years older, he remembers the singer making an enormous impression on him.
“His singing was so distinctive and distinctive. His songs contact our hearts as they simply relate to our on a regular basis life and his talent of writing songs was a testomony to his wonderful expertise,” stated Stewart, finest identified for his 22 years as a member of Third World.
Because the inception of Rhythms Of Africa, he has honoured a number of stalwarts of Jamaican music together with guitarist Stephen “Cat” Coore and keyboardist Ibo Cooper, his colleagues in Third World. Final 12 months’s present featured Etana and Barbadian soca artiste, Alison Hinds.
Rhythms Of Africa 2025 will probably be held below the theme, ‘Music To My Ears’. It has Houston-based Nigerian violinist Demola as headliner.
A rising star, his sound is a mix of Afro Beats, pop and reggae.
Stewart, who performed on Third World’s greatest hit songs together with Attempt Jah Love, Now That We Discovered Love and Sense of Objective, has mentored lots of of scholars within the Broward County college system, lots of whom have performed within the Rhythms Of Africa band.
