The dramatic story lines, elaborate orchestration and embellished Costumes associated with opera seemingly have little in common with dancehall is uninhibited Jamaican colloquial expression, rapid synthesized beats and X-rated attire.
Yet when Jamaican deejay Buccaneer debuted at the island is Reggae Sunsplash festival in 1994, he surprisingly delivered an operatic interpretation of his hit "Hire Me", invigorating the crowd and leading dancehall into previously uncharted waters, "My mother, grandmother and great grandmother played piano and listened to that kind of music so it's a tradition thing," explains Buccaneer, born Andrew Bradford on February 21, 1972. "At Sunsplash me say bwoy, let me go up there with a different style and the idea just come to put the opera ring to it and it mash up the place. But me never really do nothing with it until the following year when me and Beenie Man did the com-bination" Woman No Matter The Money". In 1996 Buccaneer recorded "Sketel Concerto", a humorously oper-atic ode to virtuous women and one of the year's biggest hits.
The song's success produced a pack of Pavarotti parrots in the dancehall, each hoping to duplicate Buccaneer's unique formula for success. Since then, operatic oratorio has figured prominently in the swashbuckling deejay's style enhancing the bad boy boasting and compliments to the ladies, which comprise his latest release, "Da Opera." Uniting disparate cultural elements occurs quite naturally for Buccaneer, reflecting a childhood divided between two contrasting areas of Kingston, Jamaica. "People have this idea it's uptown me come from but I was born in Waltham Park, the ghetto and I lived there with my father," he clarifies. "My mother moved to Havendale and some other places uptown but me just go there now and then . . ..me live in the ghetto, where youths run up and down, it's a different vibe.
All the youths in Havendale have bicycle, me the only one never have them luxury cause me mother was poor. As me bust (breakthrough) in 1994, a little mix up happen downtown so me leave and go uptown." Andrew Bradford was nicknamed Buccaneer when he began wearing a patch over his left eye that was overly sensitive to the effects of sunlight. The condition has been corrected but the plundering pirate moniker remains, In 1981, Buccaneer moved to the Kingston suburb of Portmore with his mother where he began deejaying at various school activities, even in the corridors between classes. It wasn't long before he set his sights on a professional pursuit of music hoping to emulate the success of his idol, Shabba Ranks. Buccaneer spent many nights sacrificing sleep, waiting for the chance to demonstrate his vocal skills on various sound sys-tems; his first opportunity arrived with Portmore's Climax sound system. He then began making the obligato-ry rounds attempting to record with Kingston's best producers.
But's first hit "P Plus" (for producer Derrick Barnett) was recorded in 1991; "P-Plus's" explicit lyrics precluded airplay but the song gained popularity through repeated spins on the sound system circuit. In 1992, Buccaneer linked up with (General) Degree who brought him to another Kingston producer, Piper. They did a few recordings for Piper and then went to pro-ducer Danny Browne.
As soon as Buccaneer dropped anchor at Browne's Main Street recording studios the deejay's dominance on the dancehall charts began; his clever double entendre laden tune "Neighborhood" although nearly banned from the airwaves, was number one for 19 weeks! Buccaneer went on to record a succession of hits including "Hey Ya, Hey Ya", "Nuh Response", "Hey Girl", "Chatty Chatty Mouth" and the aforementioned "Hire Me".
He followed with "Sketel Concerto" and the dance-hall boom shot "Bad Man Sonata" inspired by the Blue, Danube waltz and featured on the soundtrack to the 1997 film "Dancehall Queen". " I find classical music and opera to be soothing; to me it is the height of music," he savs. "Evervthinn is on point with that kind of musio, every note have to be right."
Each note rightly resonates on "Da Opera's"1 6 tracks spanning classical to heavy merar rnrruences and demonstrating Buccaneer's diverse skills as both artist and producer. "Da Opera's" first single "Bruk Out" fea-tures Danny Browne's "heavy metal" rhythm, a scorching guitar sample directing the track. Subtle operatic overtures highlight "Fade Away" and "Tek It Easy" while the title cut "Da Opera" based on a symphony com-posed by Guiseppe Verde, echoes "Sketel Concerto's" candid endorsement of chastity for women: "yuh nah borrow, yuh nah beg\ yuh nah easy to spread yuh leg"; the self described ladies DJ then chronicles his trav-el escapades, "sampling every nation" in the autobiographical "Plenty More Gal". I Buccaneer started his own record label, Opera House, in 1996 producing hits for deejay's Red Rat Alley Cat, Monster Shack Crew and Bounty Killer ("Warr Lord") among others. He produced most of "Da dpera" including the classically constructed title track, "Bad Man Nuh Stray", one of the year's biggest hits featuring the irrepressible Scare Dem Crew, the live sound system "juggling" of "Dancehall Vibes (Interlude)" "Hypocrite", " Gweah", "Everything To Me" featuring ltalee and "Soco Numa" which he describes as his favorite cut because "it licks out against the back biters, fighters and bad minded people".
"Da Opera" is one of dancehall Reggae's most adventurous and successful voyages navigated by a dee-jay unafraid of the rough seas of musical experimentation. "You know my music is always different than what other people are doing because me deal with classical music and opera," says Buccaneer. "Beethoven is my favorite because they say him a madman and me is kind of a half crazy youth most time. People who think weird, out of the way musically like Johann Strauss, Mozart, Tchiakovsky, Verde, I rate them men there too; them people have that kind of mad vibe." What would the classical masters think of their compositions now being incorporated into Jamaican dance-hall? In a word, bravo!!
