by Justine Ketola

06/14/2009

Ziggy Marley - "What Is Reggae" at Club Nokia Los Angeles June 6, 2009

"Lift up your hearts with a smile, lift up your feet with a dance, lift up your spirit with a song, its family time!"

The first-ever Grammy museum event took place at the new Club Nokia in the LA Live complex on June 6, 2009.  This is the home of the new Grammy museum and adjacent to the Staples Center where the Lakers play and the actual Grammy Awards presentation is held.  The kids-oriented daytime concert "What is Reggae?"  featured Ziggy Marley who performed songs from his new FAMILY TIME recording and greeted fans who purchased the CD for an autograph session after the event.

The warm up group led the kids at the newly minted Club Nokia through a percussion jam, with everyone taking part in the festivities with instruments provided for the kiddies.  As Ziggy explains, the motivation for this  album FAMILY TIME  "This record represents my daily family life and is inspired by my three-year-old daughter Judah and baby Gideon.""  Both of  these children joined Ziggy on stage with Judah situated next to the background vocalist and Gideon stage right of his Daddy beating on a congo drum throughout the show.

As the show began, with the classic Bob Marley song, "This Train" Ziggy got the kids involved by "picking up speed" as the song turned into a ska tempo, with the original Bob Marley and the Wailers engineer Errol Brown at the controls and setting up the monitor mix was another legendary reggae personality, Fabian Cooke (The Lion King, Wackies, etc.)

Produced by Ziggy along with Don Was, the album has a wide array of guest performers and the performance at Club Nokia featured the full roster of his talented band including legendary reggae drummer Santa Davis, percussionist Rock Deadrick (Ben Harper, Tracy Chapman), longtime touring guitarist Takeshi Akimoto, guitarist Ian "Beezy" Coleman and keyboardist Michael Hyde, as well as bass guitarist Pablo Stennett.

The album has so much to offer and the  song "ABC" has Ziggy  listing a beautiful array of elements (to the tune of "Bend Down Low") representing the alphabet with A is for Africa,  B is for Brother, C is for Caring, and so forth.  The game Simon Says turns into "Ziggy Says," taking the shape of a wonderful role play with all sorts of fun commands including "Ziggy says make the sign of peace" and "Ziggy says roar like a lion," where he noted, "I like that one."

On "Take Me To Jamaica" (which features a collaboration with Toots Hibbert on the album release) his lyrics rang true, as he sang, "Take me take me to Jamaica now, where we can live in the country, eat fruits from the tree, everythings's irie, the coconut water is sweet!"

When he went into his father's classic, "Jammin'" the crowd roared and he encouraged everyone to walk tall promoting self-esteem building with the youth. Beezy took a great guitar solo at this point in the show.  During "Cry Cry Cry" (which features Jack Johnson and Paula Fuga on the album version) Ziggy says, "this song is for all of the criers out there, those that don't want to go to bed."

Ziggy took a moment to remind the audience that "The kids are our heroes, remember that when you look at your kids. Give them the information that they need,"  before going into the song "Future Man, Future Lady", a gospel- tinged track that featuers Paul Simon on the album version. With lyrics like "Future Lady's confident and Future Man knows what to do, he's got a plan to help this land," the song sounds like a nod to the first family inhabiting the White House!

He led the band in a type of solo for each instrument which also served as instruction for the children, with Rock explaining all of the drum names and demonstrating what they sounded like, Santa taking a solo, with Pablo, Beezy, Michael and the other band mates following suit.

Before starting "I Love You Too" Ziggy explained that the song's origin came from a moment where his daughter Judah looked at him one day and told him, "I love you" and he told her "I love you too."   The two of them shared lines during the song and Judah pointed at her daddy while singing the refrain, "I love you too!" The recorded version on FAMILY TIME features a multi-generational Marley love fest with mama Rita and sister Cedella Marley contributing vocals.

As the show began its finale, Ziggy explained that the "whole world is one big family" before launching into the title track,  "Family Time."  On the recording of title track, three-year-old Judah helps her father implore listeners, young and old, to "lift up your hearts with a smile...it's time to be free."  Judah started the lyrics of the song during the live performance singing, "Hi How you doing, hi how have you been."

The song "Hold 'Em Joe" closed the set, with Ziggy explaining, "In Jamaica we have a lot of donkeys...this is the first song I sang on stage as a child, a traditional Jamaican folk song." The album also includes the song and part of the proceeds from the album help to benefit the Chepstowe Basic School in Port Antonio, Jamaica.

Marley has been repeatedly drawn to family-friendly projects as a musician, humanitarian and even an actor. He is an active supporter of Little Kids Rock, which brings musical instruments and music lessons to children in public schools, and he founded U.R.G.E. (Unlimited Resources Giving Enlightenment), a non-profit organization that benefits a wide range of charitable children's causes in Jamaica and other developing nations.

Marley hopes to share the messages of FAMILY TIME with children and families the world over. Ziggy performed during the annual Easter egg hunt at the White House to celebrate FAMILY TIME and hopes to do more children's books, and kid-oriented recordings and even an animated series.  Ziggy has performed in the animated film "Shark's Tale" on "Sesame Street" and his song, "Believe In Yourself"  is the theme for the children's show Arthur. His ambitious, multimedia approach reflects the varied ideas of FAMILY TIME. "Usually my songs mean more than one thing. Family Time is my family, your family, the world's family."

Ziggy Marley is on tour around the United States with the group 311. For more information including the lyrics to the songs on FAMILY TIME can be found  at www.ziggymarley.com