Leslie Kong’s name rarely appears on the marquee, but his fingerprints are all over the songs that made Jamaica’s music a global language. A Chinese-Jamaican businessman who began life running an ice-cream parlour, a restaurant and a record shop on Orange Street in Kingston, Kong turned a chance audition outside his shop into Beverley’s Records and effectively launched modern reggae. His label and production work took ska and rocksteady, polished them, and helped shape early reggae into an exportable sound that found listeners from London to New York.
Kong was born in 1933 and, with little formal musical training, used business nous rather than studio pedigree to hire Kingston’s finest players, organise sessions, and treat artists fairly at a time when many producers did not. A meeting in 1961 with a teenage Jimmy Cliff, singing Dearest Beverley outside the Beverley’s shop, persuaded Kong to set up a label. Cliff not only recorded but also became an A&R sounding board, bringing other talent to Kong’s ear. Those early moves set the pattern for how Beverley’s would operate – a commercial engine run with Jamaican soul.
Kong’s role as a talent spotter is the stuff of music lore. He recorded Bob Marley’s debut singles Judge Not and One Cup Of Coffee in 1962, giving the future global icon crucial early studio experience. He backed the recordings with the Beverley’s All-Stars, a studio nucleus of musicians who defined the Kong sound – an economical, keyboard-and-bass-driven bedrock that carried lead vocals with clarity. Those early Wailers sessions, and subsequent Kong compilations, would later surface as The Best Of The Wailers.
Leslie Kong’s biggest commercial breakthroughs came with Desmond Dekker. Kong produced Dekker’s 007 (Shanty Town) in 1967, but it was Israelites in 1969 that proved seismic, topping the UK singles chart and reaching the Top 10 in the United States, selling in the millions, and proving reggae’s crossover potential. Kong’s polished productions, and his willingness to license recordings to UK labels such as Island, Pyramid and Trojan, turned Jamaican singles into international hits.
No account of early reggae is complete without Toots & The Maytals, and Kong’s partnership with Toots Hibbert produced some of the genre’s most indelible records. From 1969 to 1971, Kong and Toots enjoyed a hot streak: 54-46 That’s My Number, Pressure Drop, Monkey Man and Sweet And Dandy are all Kong productions that helped carry the sound overseas, and they later featured prominently on The Harder They Come soundtrack, the film that introduced many international audiences to Jamaican music.
Kong’s catalogue is staggering for its breadth. He produced early singles by Jimmy Cliff, Bob Marley, Joe Higgs, Derrick Morgan, Ken Boothe, The Melodians, The Pioneers, The Gaylads, Delroy Wilson, Bruce Ruffin, Roland Alphonso and many others. He licensed material to overseas labels, assembled compilation LPs that compiled Beverley’s hits, and even organised the reggae session that produced Paul Simon’s Mother And Child Reunion – a rare instance of a mainstream American pop star using Jamaican musicians and Kong’s production sensibility. Kong’s sudden death from a heart attack in August 1971 robbed Jamaican music of one of its most effective commercial architects at the height of his influence.
Below is a comprehensive, though not exhaustive, list of recordings and songs Leslie Kong is known to have worked on. Many of these titles were issued on Beverley’s, then licensed to Pyramid, Island or Trojan for wider release. The list reads like an A-Z of early Jamaican popular music, and it explains why Kong’s imprint remains audible across decades of reggae reissues and compilations.
Comprehensive List Of Songs And Recordings Leslie Kong Worked On
The Beverley’s All-Stars Instrumentals
Sleepwalk, El Torro, Just In Time, On The Move
Bob Marley & The Wailers
Judge Not, One Cup Of Coffee, Soul Shakedown Party, The Best Of The Wailers (compilation)
Bruce Ruffin
Rain, (I’m A) Big Man
Delroy Wilson
Once Upon A Time, Cool Operator
Derrick Morgan
Be Still, Sunday Monday, Forward March, Housewives’ Choice, Don’t You Know
Desmond Dekker & The Aces
Honour Your Mother And Father, Madgie, Get Up Adina, It Was Only A Dream, Just One Little Girl, This Woman, Mount Zion, Soldering, 007 (Shanty Town), Israelites, It’s A Shame
The Gaylads
Joy In The Morning, There’s A Fire
Joe Higgs
I’m The One, Captivity
Jimmy Cliff
Dearest Beverley, Hurricane Hattie, Miss Jamaica, You Can Get It If You Really Want (tracks for The Harder They Come soundtrack)
John Holt (and Stranger Cole)
Midnight Train, Draw Your Brakes
Ken Boothe
Freedom Street, Drum Song, Old Time Religion
The Melodians
Rivers Of Babylon, Sweet Sensation
Peter Tosh
Can’t Blame The Youth (early sessions, disputed releases)
The Pioneers
Long Shot Kick De Bucket, Give Me A Little Loving
Roland Alphonso
Guantanamo Ska, Ska Copter (and numerous instrumentals)
Stranger Cole
Uno Dos Tres, Draw Your Brakes
Toots & The Maytals
54-46 That’s My Number, Pressure Drop, Monkey Man, Sweet And Dandy, Bam Bam, Got To Stop This World
Other Artists / Contributions
Jackie Edwards, Jackie Opel, Lloyd Clarke, Eric “Monty” Morris, Millie Small, The Clarendonians, Lynn Taitt & The Jets, Freddie McKay, The Mellotones, Baba Brooks, Glen Adams, The Slickers, Ansel Collins, Don Drummond, Paul Simon (Mother And Child Reunion sessions)
Compilations And Albums (Produced Or Compiled By Kong / Beverley’s)
Original Reggae Hot Shots, King Size Reggae, Golden Hits By The Greats, Reggae Chartbusters, Hot Shots Of Reggae, Best Of Beverley’s Records 1969-1970, The Best Of Beverley’s Records (Masterpieces From The Works Of Leslie Kong), The King Kong Compilation, Leslie Kong’s Connection Vol. 1 & Vol. 2, The Sound Of Beverley’s, The King Of Ska: The Beverley’s Records Singles Collection
Leslie Kong’s story is one of a businessman who learned to listen. He never sought the spotlight, but he created the conditions that allowed Jamaica’s brightest voices to be heard around the world. If you’ve enjoyed a reggae classic from the late 1960s or early 1970s on vinyl or streaming, chances are you’ve heard Kong’s work, even if you didn’t know his name.
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