Remembering Jimmy Cliff, Who Sent Reggae Soaring

The Jamaican singer-songwriter and star of ‘The Harder They Come,’ who died Monday at age 81, was pivotal in bringing the genre onto the world stage.

Even in 1969, Jimmy Cliff, who died Monday at age 81, could see what was coming. Though British rule over his home country of Jamaica ended in 1962, independence and economic mismanagement led to high unemployment and a foundering youth culture. The result was a steady shift in the music-rich island from joyous ska and soulful rock-steady to reggae, a more brooding genre that addressed social and personal issues.

Jimmy Cliff passed away at 81. (X@UB40)

Mr. Cliff was already writing songs with these values. His sardonically bouncy song “Vietnam,” from his self-titled album released in 1969, was said to have been Bob Dylan’s favorite antiwar song. That same year, he was approached to star in “The Harder They Come,” a crime film. He brought with him a soundtrack of emerging reggae artists, including Desmond Dekker, the Slickers, Scotty, the Melodians and the Maytals. But the film and LP stalled due to funding shortfalls and weren’t released in the U.S. until 1973. The movie helped popularize early reggae worldwide and transformed Mr. Cliff into Jamaica’s first global superstar.

Over the course of his seven-decade career, Mr. Cliff recorded more than 25 albums, and three of his singles charted on the Billboard 100. He won two Grammy Awards, and “The Harder They Come” was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2008. He also was awarded the Order of Merit, the highest honor granted by Jamaica for arts and science achievement.

His musical importance is rooted in his foresight, helping to foster a music style that both carved out a new identity for Jamaican musicians and embraced the island’s African heritage. “The Harder They Come” and its soundtrack influenced not only Jamaican musicians including Bob Marley, the Wailers and Dennis Brown but also rock artists such as Eric Clapton, the Clash, Elvis Costello, the Police and Blondie.

As Mr. Cliff told the Journal in a 2013 interview about the title track: “The song for me was about social and artistic change. When I lived in the U.K., I recorded a lot of ska and rock-steady styles of Jamaican music. But people there weren’t accepting it. So I began using a faster reggae beat.”

Abandoned by his mother shortly after his birth in Jamaica in 1944, Mr. Cliff was raised by his father and grandmother. As a child, he was captivated by local music after hearing a neighbor’s sound system playing mento, a Jamaican folk style. Beginning in the 1950s, Jamaica had a strong tradition of home-built stereo systems that were played outside and used for street dance parties. Musicians strived to create music that was different and to stand out at talent contests.

Mr. Cliff entered these contests early and began writing songs that were a mash of ska, rock-steady and calypso, globally popular then thanks to a string of hits by Harry Belafonte. Following the Maytals’ 1968 hit “Do the Reggay,” with its choppy beat, steady rhythm guitar, throbbing bass and wailing horns, Mr. Cliff wrote songs that expressed social and personal themes.

After singing at the 1964 World’s Fair in New York, he was discovered by the British producer Chris Blackwell of Island Records. Blackwell signed him, and Mr. Cliff moved to London with the promise of fame there. Struggling to gain recognition, he returned to Jamaica in 1969 to play with local musicians.

Mr. Cliff’s first five albums, starting in 1967, were gentle and gospel-influenced in their arrangements and feel. As a child, Mr. Cliff had been a standout singer in his church choir and in school. Later in 1969, he was at Dynamic Sounds Studio in Kingston, Jamaica, recording “You Can Get It If You Really Want” when he was approached to be in a film.

In the Journal interview, he detailed the moment he was recruited for the film: “When we finished, I walked outside and met a gentleman named Perry Henzell, who had been waiting for me. He said he was making a movie and asked if I could write music for it.”

When he recorded “The Harder They Come,” reggae was becoming a defined style and statement in Jamaica. Once the film and soundtrack established reggae’s appeal, Mr. Cliff began making albums with a harder feel and stronger messages, though his voice was always soft and endearing. His 1973 LPs “Unlimited” and “Struggling Man” embraced reggae rhythms fully.

By 1978, his glossy album “Give Thankx” was influenced by his African travels, and its mellifluous production added the feel of American soul, showing off the power of his voice. The two albums for which Mr. Cliff won Grammys—“Cliff Hanger” (1985) and “Rebirth” (2012)—had greater punch, the former with a synthesizer overlay and the latter with edgier accompaniment.

Mr. Cliff’s final album, “Refugees,” released in 2022, was his first new record in 10 years and combined rap, rock-steady, rock and reggae. While Mr. Cliff was never as renowned internationally as Bob Marley, he lit the reggae fuse. Looking back on “The Harder They Come,” he said in the Journal interview that the song’s words held special meaning: “The lyrics came from my past. I grew up in the church and had always questioned what they were telling me. Like the promise of a pie in the sky when you die.”

Mr. Myers is the author of two volumes of “Anatomy of a Song” and “Rock Concert: An Oral History” (Grove Press).