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    Home»Latest News»Vincentian musicians pay tribute to music icon Bernard ‘Bonnie’ Browne – Caribbean Life
    Latest News

    Vincentian musicians pay tribute to music icon Bernard ‘Bonnie’ Browne – Caribbean Life

    R innissBy R innissJanuary 24, 2024No Comments7 Mins Read
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    Search our complete information to caribbean events in NYC for extra native occasions — or submit your own!

    Regardless of the snowy climate, a number of Vincentian musicians and artistes within the New York Metropolitan Space on Friday night paid tribute to Vincentian music icon Bernard “Bonnie” Browne throughout a Memorial Tribute at St. Gabriel’s Episcopal Church on Hawthorne Road in Brooklyn.

    Browne died on Dec. 10 in Brooklyn. He was 73.

    The late Vincentian musician Bonnie Browne. Courtesy Browne household

    Amongst collaborating musicians and artistes had been: Pre-eminent Caribbean musical arranger Dr. Frankie McIntosh (piano); Adrian Bailey (keyboard); Gordon Sutherland, Peter Knight and Steve Harry (guitar); Garry Tate (saxophone); Ike Jeffers, Phillip “Phil Patch” Baptiste and Ploomie Lewis (bass); Nedi Billinghurst and Owusu Slater (congas); and Donald “Dakka” Griffith, Garfield “Gary” Palmer, Dr. Roxie Morris and Chester Peters (vocals).

    Dakka sang a few of Bob Marley’s musical hits, together with “One Love” and “No Girl, No Cry”; and Dr. Morris, sang, amongst others, “For the Goodness of God.”

    Through the close to two-hour-long memorial service, the congregation participated within the signing of hymns and intercessory prayers, which had been presided over by the church’s Jamaican-born rector, the Very Rev. Canon Donovan Ivanhoe Leys.

    “Consolation us in our sorrows on the dying of our brother Bernard,” Fr. Leys prayed. “Let our religion be our comfort, and everlasting life our hope.”

    Later, he stated: “We convey to his household our deepest sympathy.”

    Bonnie’s widow, Annette, and their kids Damany, Niambi and Lisa; grandchildren Kylie and Leo; siblings Mackie and Shani; in addition to different members of the family and mates, had been amongst celebrants.

    “It’s stunning,” Damany Browne advised Caribbean Life instantly after the Memorial Tribute. “I actually respect all the things. That is what he at all times needed.

    “He was Clymax endlessly,” he stated, referring to the defunct band that his dad had shaped in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

    Peters stated the musical tribute was “fairly apropos”, stating that “Bonni was not only a band chief, he was a lover of music – all genres.

    “And he was prepared to share his data and collaborate with different musicians,” he stated. “So, it was becoming that musicians who labored straight with him. or collaborated with him at any level, selected to come back collectively, whatever the climate, to pay tribute to him within the language he knew and liked a lot – music.

    “In as a lot as I anticipated the inevitable passing of brother Bonnie, nothing fairly ready me for the reality,” Peters added. “It was a tragic day, certainly. Bonnie was not solely a distinguished musician in SVG (St. Vincent and the Grenadines), he was a real music lover. And past that, he was a born-leader – a bonafide skilled.

    “I keep in mind, as a really younger singer, going to follow for a present on the Clymax band room, how professionally he performed the rehearsal,” he continued. “He had a fantastic respect for punctuality, order and group. Additionally, he commanded the respect of his fellow band members and the opposite artistes.”

    Peters stated his “biggest reminiscence of Bonnie has and can at all times be his willingness, at Winston Soso’s request, to have my group, Soul Issue, carry out with Clymax at a dance at Crow’s Nest (in St. Vincent and the Grenadines).

    “It was the spotlight of my fledgling profession,” he stated. “Bonnie and Winston would by no means totally perceive what that did for me as a younger, impressionable, immature, not sure performer. To me, it was an acknowledgment of potential that I clung tightly to henceforth.

    “And I do know that he equally helped different younger artistes, akin to Motif, and lots of extra,” Peters added. “It’s simply left for me to say thanks for the help, brother Bonnie; thanks for the musical reminiscences; thanks for being a fantastic position mannequin for younger artistes. The ancestors are proud.”

    Dr. Frankie McIntosh plays the piano.
    Dr. Frankie McIntosh performs the piano. Photograph by Nelson A. King

    Dr. McIntosh stated the Memorial Tribute was “deserving,” stating that Bonnie “would respect it.”

    “He was at all times dedicated to music; he was at all times learning,” he added. “He was conscious of what was new in jazz concord. He was an inspiration to me.

    “Though we knew his (medical) situation, the following day he was practising,” Dr. McIntosh continued. “My important impression was his dedication to music, his devotion. He was a musician at coronary heart, primarily jazz.”

    Phil Patch stated the celebration was “good,” including, nonetheless: “We may have gotten extra folks, if it weren’t for the storm.

    “Though the session wasn’t crowded, the session was nice,” he stated. “He (Bonnie) was the person who organized Vincy Carnival in 1977. Bonni was an icon; I’ve him as St. Vincent and the Grenadines’ icon in music.”

    Jeffers, a bass guitarist with the defunct Vincentian band Asterisks, described the tribute as “good.”

    “I loved it,” he stated. “As musicians, we now have to really assist and preserve one another’s spirits up. That is our life.”

    In eulogizing Bonnie at his funeral service in Kingstown, the Vincentian capital, on Jan. 5, Michael “Mike” Browne, Bonnie’s eldest brother and former training minister in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, stated his brother’s first musical affect was their mom, who learn music and performed the piano.

    Browne stated that, at 14, Bonnie “took management” of his field guitar that their father had purchased for Mike “as an award for good efficiency within the 1964 GCE (Abroad Common Certificates of Training) examination.

    “There was no turning again,” he stated. “He actually lived on the guitar.

    “Bonnie’s musical evolution over teenage years, mixed with common attendance on the Calypso Tent exhibits, resulted in his improvement right into a severe music fanatic,” he added. “Alongside his co-enthusiast Band-I, each nonetheless youngsters, he took the brave step of forming a band with the backing of our sister, Elma, then just lately returned from nursing coaching in England, and monetary assist from uncle Chippie Browne.”

    Browne stated Bonnie shaped Quantity 5 in 1969, with 5 members: Bonnie (marimba); Band-I (guitar); cousin Noel John (bass guitar); buddy Vin Boney (drums); and Ken “Growler” (vocals).

    “Recognized for mastering the Spooge beat, originating in Barbados, Quantity 5 grew to become a preferred combo, acting at venues all through St. Vincent (and the Grenadines),” Browne stated.

    He stated Clymax “grew out of Quantity 5” within the early Nineteen Seventies, quickly turning into “the reggae band”, and that its recognition grew.

    Browne famous that 1977 was a “watershed 12 months” within the lifetime of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, stating that the nation’s “cultural umbilical twine” with Trinidad and Tobago, was lower, when the native Carnival Improvement Committee (CDC) shifted Vincy Carnival to July.

    “Bonnie wrote the long-lasting calypso, ‘Vincy Model in July,’ “which quickly grew to become the Carnival Anthem,” Browne stated.

    He stated that, over time and many years, Clymax produced many recordings and hits, and carried out in a number of venues within the Caribbean, Canada and the US, “and backed up the nice bards of calypso, together with Sparrow, Shadow, Nelson, Calypso Rose, Arrow and Barron.”

    Throughout his life, Browne stated his brother was at all times involved in regards to the three “Rs” of the music business: “Rights, Recognition and Returns.”

    “Rights: all authorized rights, together with copyrights, should be defended; recognition: artistes, together with musicians, must be accorded full recognition of their position in nationwide improvement; (and) returns: artistes ought to obtain acceptable monetary returns for his or her work,” Browne stated.

    “Bonnie had many loves however, by far, his two passionate loves had been music and household,” he added. “When these two got here collectively within the USA, he determined that that’s the place he would make dwelling, regardless that SVG remained one of many many loves.”

    Palmer, one of many organizers of the Memorial Tribute and a former vocalist and trumpeter with Clymax, stated that, when he approached the Vincentian musicians and artistes to carry the occasion, “they had been prepared and prepared to come back,” including that “not one had reservations.”

    “And we thanks all for popping out,” he advised the service.



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