Sylvester “Itoobaa” Peter, the veteran reggae artist who amazed us with his award-winning and hit album, Freedom, arguably the best reggae album produced in St. Lucia, and as part of 4th World contributed three tracks to the band’s award-winning album, Can’t Stop Us, has a knack of not only composing hit songs but of combining reggae with other genres to produce interesting and exciting strains of music.
Some of his compositions include reggae jazz, blues reggae, creole reggae, Latin reggae, and folk reggae. One fan was so delighted with Tchenbé-La, one of Itoobaa’s creole reggae compositions, that she likened it to the coming together of Derek Walcott, Sesenne Descarte, and Bob Marley.
The title track of the Freedom album, an international reggae hit, is a blues reggae song, and so is Now She is Gone, a soulful blues reggae tracks on Can’t Stop Us, which is one of the most catching tunes on the album.
Manmai Sent Lisi, another one of Itoobaa’s reggae blends, is not only sung in Kwéyòl, but seamlessly fuses St. Lucian folk, jazz, Latin, reggae, music of the St. Lucia national anthem, and African rhythms to create what a critic described as a wonderful masterpiece.
With Man and Woman (I’m a Rasta Man), Itoobaa fuses reggae with smooth jazz in a manner that would make the likes of George Benson and Grover Washington proud. The music comes across as an irresistible, unstoppable, progressive force of nature.
In this modern, fast-paced, fast-changing, everything goes world, Man and Man takes us to a world of family division of labor, where a “man works for all the things his family needs, and the woman takes care of the youths.” A world of committed, monogamous relations, where a man respect and treasures his woman, because, after all, “I’m a rasta man, got to have my rasta woman; I’m a king man, got to have my queen woman.”
Shot partly in the ghetto, the video has a gritty feel, however, it speaks of living in harmony with nature, communal fellowship, committed love, family togetherness, exultation of the woman’s role as bearer of life, and man as breadwinner and protector of the family.
Man and Woman cements Itoobaa’s place as one of the top reggae artists on the island and suggests there is little chance of the spring of his hit songs running dry anytime soon.
The world owes Itoobaa much gratitude, for he continues to push the edge of world reggae both in terms of language and the genres of music he fuses and bends to his will.
