Edited by Azizi Powell
This is Part I of a two part pancocojams series that showcases YouTube videos made from 1964 film clips of Ska music and dancing at The Sombrero Club in Jamaica.
Part I includes information about The Sombrero Club in Jamaica and showcases the first two videos of that YouTube series. Part
Click https://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2020/03/two-additional-1964-film-clips-of-ska.html for Part II of this pancocojams series. Part II showcases the last two videos of that YouTube series.
Selected comments from these videos' discussion threads are also included in those posts.
The content of this post is presented for cultural, entertainment, and aesthetic purposes.
All copyrights remain with their owners.
Thanks to all those who are quoted in this post and thanks to all those who are featured in these videos. Thanks also to Kingstoned - soundzz for publishing these videos on YouTube.
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Click http://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2019/04/information-videos-comments-about.html "Jamaican Skanking (Dance) Information, Videos, & Comments" for additional videos of ska music and dancing.
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ARTICLE EXCERPT ABOUT THE SOMBRERO CLUB IN JAMAICA
From http://old.skabook.com/foundationska/2016/07/the-sombrero-club/ Heather Augustyn, July 24, 2016
.... I decided to refresh my spirit with what was likely about my 52nd time viewing "This is Ska” documentary from 1964, hosted by Tony Verity and found on YouTube ..., and I realized I had recently come across an article on the site of this historically crucial film–The Sombrero Club. So here, from the Jamaica Gleaner on November 20, 2005, is the text from that article entitled, “The nightclubs of yesteryear: Sombrero: rustic, intimate,” written by the prolific journalist Mel Cooke.
Just below the famous ‘Four Roads’ intersection of Molynes and Waltham Park Roads in St. Andrew, a long grey wall marks the first right turn. There was a time when 1 Pitter Avenue was not so drab and businesslike, when the sights and sounds of merriment carried all the way to one of the capital city’s major intersections, long before the commerce of construction replaced the commerce of merriment. And although it carried a Mexican name, the senors and senoritas who stepped inside the Sombrero nightclub did it in true Jamaican style.
“When you stay out at Four Roads you can look down and see Sombrero and hear the music. If you climb up on the wall you look down into Sombrero,” said bass player Jackie Jackson, who was once a member of Tommy McCook and the Supersonics and now plays with Toots and the Maytals. Looking over was one thing;
jumping into the fun without paying was quite another matter. “Nobody naa beat the gate,” Jackson said, remembering an entrance fee of 50 shillings. “It was a mature audience.”
It was also an audience that demanded a certain quality of entertainment and, in the height of the band era the cream of the cream played there. “It was one of the premier dance halls for bands, live music,” says Jasper Adams, a regular at The Sombrero. “If you capture the image of the dance hall in London at the time, you get an idea of what it was like.”
The Sombrero was owned by the Young brothers, one of them. Owen, is now reportedly in the USA.
Putting a “1966 onwards” stamp on the heyday of The Sombrero, Adams named Byron Lee and the Dragonaires, as well as Kes Chin and the Souvenirs, among the many bands that played there. But there was one that owned the joint on a Friday night: Carlos Malcolm and the Afro-Caribbean Rhythms, with Winston ‘The Whip’ Williams as the MC. He remembers Derrick Harriott, as part o f the Jiving Juniors, singing there.
Winston Blake of Merritone also notes the presence of The Mighty Vikings, with Sonny and Victor Wong on lead vocals, and a very powerful Tomorrow’s Children, who “were a great show band. They played a lot of Chicago.”
“The Sombrero came up when the Bournmouthe (in East Kingston) sort of got down. It was the new uptown place,” Adams said. “The lively era was when you had to park on Moresham Avenue.”
“Normally the place would ripen from Monday to Sunday, but Friday night was dance night,” Adam s said. On Sundays there was jazz. put on by Ken Peart, with people like Billy Cooke on trumpet, Thaddy Mowatt on bass and Aubrey Adams on piano.
With a raised bandstand over the dance floor, performers got a bird’s eye view of the audience they were playing to. Whether jazz or dance (or in the later days of the club, the sound system of Merritone Music), the decor of Sombrero was standard and, for the time, very different. “It no run down or mash up,” Jackie Jackson emphasised, terming it as what would now be boo, and there were four covered edges around the dance floor. “It was square, like a carton box,” Jackson said. And along with the rusticity was a certain feature that made it even more notable. “The club dark!” Jackson said, laughing. “That was what the club was famous for. It just dark and nice.”
As Winston Blake of Merritone puts it, The Sombrero was “extremely intimate”. He ”also recalls an outstanding feature of the decor which was really natural. There was an almond tree at the right of the entrance, which was on Molynes Road. “Merritone took the last lap,” Blake said of The Sombrero. “We used to play there midweek and weekends. It was the place to go on a Saturday night. It was a dress-up place, suits. Those days when you went to a night-club you wore a jacket. We are talking about the late 1960s, about 1965 to 1972.”
He said Merritone actually played there till the days of the Sombrero as a nightclub came to an end. “For us, Sombrero was a lot of daylight sessions, 4:00 a.m., 5:00 a.m., 6:00 a.m. At some of these sessions breakfast was served,” he said. “We called it the mid-week and breakfast club,” he said, chuckling.
There was a particular item that Sombrero was renowned for, which was not necessarily breakfast fare. Their chicken was fried, fabulous and famous. Jackie Jackson equates the clientele in the club to the other great place for bands at the time, the Glass Bucket in Half-Way Tree, “At the same time the Glass Bucket used to bring out the upscale people, Sombrero used to bring out the little bit down,” he said.
And, eventually, it was bringing out fewer and fewer of them. “It just did its time. We notice it start getting less and less, till we just stop going there,” Jackson said. ‘That is Jamaica. Everything is just for a while.”...
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SHOWCASE VIDEOS
Example #1: Ska Ska Ska Part 1 - A Regular Ska Session at the Sombrero Club in Jamaica - various artists
Kingstoned - soundzz, Dec 24, 2008
This is ska,, there were little pieces of this film on you tube now its complete in 4 parts hope you like this one its a great documentary about a ska party in jamaica in that time at the sombrero club ..so if you want to learn how to dance the ska see this video ...on part 2 3 and 4 you can .see jimmy clif, the blues busters ,the maytals prince buster and some other artists doing there best to make a good video ,lots of energie introduced by byron lee ....enjoy!!! merry x-mas to every1 and a happy 2009
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Here are some comments from this video's discussion thread (with numbers added for referencing purpose only).
1. PrinceAndrew100. 2009
"Only thing is that's NOT how you do the ska!"
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REPLY
2. ehites, 2012
"Folks need to know that Byron Lee & the Dragonaires (with all due respect) were basically a copy band, for a long time, and played mostly covers early on (like this song) for the "uptown" crowd. Downtown (and country) ska was a bit different, definitely less contrived. . This is actually kinda funny.. I'm sure very few TOWN ska dances were filmed, if any are out there I wish they would surface!!! (These comments from one who knows...and who knows knows..)"
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3. Carlos Trujillo, 2010
"ska rules!!!"
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4. jamessalter1, 2011
"Thats rowing, not humping then."
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5. skarapado, 2012
"SKINHEAD REMEMBER YOUR ROOTS
BLACK ROOTS!!!"
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Click https://www.okayplayer.com/originals/vic-mensa-black-skinhead.html for the article "Black Skinhead: Vic Mensa And The Distortion Of The Skinhead Subculture" by Elijah C. Watson, June 05, 2018
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Example #2: Ska Ska Ska Part 2 - A Regular Ska Session at the Sombrero Club in Jamaica - various artists
Kingstoned - soundzz, Dec 24, 2008
This Is Ska Part 2 Live at the Sombrero Club in Jamaica...ENJOY!!!
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Here are some comments from this video's discussion thread (with numbers added for referencing purpose only).
1. bgoodmann, 2010
"Kojak, to answer both your questions, Prince Buster appears to be wearing a Chicago Bears hat. I doubt he was a fan of American football in the early 1960's and probably got the hat for the letter "C" logo. Prince Busters birth name was Cecil Campbell. The bass player in the clip is Byron Lee, bandleader of the Dragonaires."
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2. TONE B HURT, 2015
"THIS IZ IT! FANTASTIC. JAMAICA SKA, SOME OF THE GREATEST EVER........TOOTS & THE MAYTALS, PRINCE BUSTER, BYRON LEE & THE DRAGONAIRES +pablowkingstoned U R Thee Best!"
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3. MickyP4, 2016
"WHAT YEAR WAS THIS FILMED ??? THE SPIRIT OF 69 TRU SKINS LOVED THE MUSIC & CLOBBER"
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REPLY
4. Rastawelt, 2016
"1964 in Kingston, Jamaica"
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This concludes Part I of this two part pancocojams series.
Thanks for visiting pancocojams.
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