Early in my music life, when I was trying my wings, a major influence was the work of the late Louise Bennett of Jamaica. ‘Miss Lou’, as she was affectionately known, had become a legend in her time for pioneering the use of dialect in her poetry, and she was an inspiration to novice writers of my stripe.
Her ability to use dialect, combined with her unique sense of humour, was a perfect model for me. In particular, the fact that she was drawing crowds to see her alone on a stage, reading nothing but her dialect poems, served to encourage me that I was on the right path of aiming my work at Caribbean audiences, singing about the Caribbean and confidently using dialect words and expressions.
