people:
U-Roy
(b. 1942) A native of the Kingston, Jamaica, U-Roy (born Ewart Beckford), also known as the Originator, is credited with bringing wider popularity to the Jamaican “toasting” style — an ancestor to modern Rap that traces its roots back to the late 1950s. U-Roy landed his first professional gig as a DJ in 1961, when he was 19. At the time in Jamaica, the actual choice of a record was the job of the “selector,” while the DJ was the “hype man” on the microphone, much like those on American radio. Early Jamaican DJs would improvise call-and-response routines with the original...