MyGen
Profile GeneratorAndy Bassford has been playing on reggae records since 1977, making his recording debut on Horace Andy's classic album "In The Light." Growing up in Connecticut, he first played classical violin and viola in school orchestras. Andy then took up guitar after seeing B.B. King for the first time on TV in 1968. He played in a succession of local rock bands during high school and college. Andy's first exposure to reggae came through seeing "The Harder They Come" at the college movie theater, and he became determined to learn more about the music he had heard in the film.
Through the auspices of Hartford record shop owner and entrepreneur Dwight "Beltone" Barrett, Andy joined the Mighty Venturians, a Hartford reggae band, in 1976, shortly after graduating from Trinity College with honors in philosophy. It was at a Venturians rehearsal that Horace Andy first heard him play and asked him to record. After the success of the "In The Light" album, which reached number one on the Black Echoes charts in England, Horace suggested that Andy accompany him on a working trip to Jamaica.
After some delay, the two arrived in Jamaica in July, 1980. Horace, dismayed by the violence accompanying the 1980 election, left after several weeks, but Andy stayed on, hoping at least to meet some of the musicians he admired so much. The transition from fan to colleague came quickly. Rather improbably, Andy became a working session player within a couple of months of his arrival in Kingston, recording 80s classics Michael Prophet's "Gun Man" for Junjo Lawes and Cornell Campbell's "Boxing" for Joe Gibbs and tracks for Dennis Brown's first major label album "Foul Play" before the year was out.
At the beginning of 1981 Andy joined Lloyd Parks and We The People, the top stage band of the era, and his session career exploded as a result of his increased visibility. From 1980-85 he was never out of the Jamaican top 40, playing on dozens of hits with Roots Radics, Sly & Robbie, the Wailers band, and many others. In addition to backing nearly every reggae artist of the period on stage, We The People was also the legendary Dennis Brown's touring band, and the de facto Reggae Sunsplash house band. They appeared with Dennis all over the world, and played on the first Reggae Sunsplash international tour backing both Dennis and Gregory Isaacs in 1985. We The People also backed Peter Tosh during his last ever stage appearance, at the Reggae Awards in 1985.
Andy left Jamaica for family reasons in 1985 and moved to New York City. But he continued to play with Dennis Brown until 1988, when he joined Toots and the Maytals while Dennis was on sabbatical in Ethiopia. He continues to play with Toots off and on to this day. In 1989 and 1990 he also toured the States with Yellowman and the Sagittarius Band, the most popular dance hall band of the time, in between Toots tours. In fact, Andy is the only guitarist to have toured with both of the most popular reggae bands of the eighties, We The People and Sagittarius.
In 1987, Andy began playing sessions for the seminal reggae producer Coxsone Dodd's Studio One label. This relationship continued up until Dodd's death in 2004, with Coxsone recording basic tracks in Jamaica and bringing them back to New York to add Andy's guitar parts. During this period, Andy overdubbed guitar onto some vintage Wailers tracks (including an unreleased gospel album), fulfilling a lifelong dream through the magic of recording technology. Andy recorded hundreds of tracks at Studio One, while also continuing to record for just about every reggae producer in New York at one point or another. He long ago lost count of the total number of songs he has played on, but guesses it must be at least 3500.
In addition to performing and/or recording with a terrifying number of reggae artists, outside of reggae Andy has performed or recorded with Percy Sledge, LaVern Baker, Ron Wood, Bobby Keys, Rosco Gordon, Coati Mundi, Trey Anastasio, Willie Nelson, Bonnie Raitt, and Graham Haynes, among countless others.
In May 2003, Andy received an award from the Jamaica Federation of Musicians for outstanding contributions to the Jamaican music industry. He received a Grammy in 2004 for Best Reggae Album for Toots and the Maytals'"True Love." Andy also played on Burning Spear's "Our Music" and Shaggy's "Clothes Drop" albums, both 2005 Grammy nominations. In 2006 he played on Bajan songstress Rihanna's worldwide hit album "A Girl Like Me," which is currently certified triple platinum worldwide.
Last year he recorded tracks for Lady Saw's, Burning Spear's, and Shaggy's newest albums and appeared on two jazz records—with Afro-Cuban percussionist Tracey and pianist/trumpeter Rob Silverman. Andy also appeared on reggae artist Rob Symenon's latest critically acclaimed release as well as the Grammy-nominated Toots album "Light Your Light" (on a second duet with Bonnie Raitt.) He also toured Japan with dancehall legend Super Cat in August, and recently added guitar tracks to original "Rent" lead Adam Pascal's upcoming album, as well as sessions for Ansel Meditation, Kayla Bliss, and Ozzie Dellimore among many others.
Currently Andy lives in the Bronx, where he plays sessions, tours occasionally with Toots and Super Cat, and performs locally with Collateral Damage, Amy Coleman, Tropical Groove, Kristina con Vita a.k.a. K.R.A.V.E, the Turnstyle Jumpers, Parti Gras, the Robert Silverman Jazz Quartet, Derrick Barnett and the Statement Band, the Moody Jews, and his own group The Blue People. He doesn't sleep much.
Andy has written articles for Guitar Player and Onstage magazines. His online reggae guitar lessons (and an essay about Alton Ellis) are available here.
These lessons can also be found in the anthology "Rhythm Guitar: The Basics and Beyond" published by Backbeat Books (available here) , and are used as reference material by instructors at the Jamaica School of Music. Andy is also writing a book about his experiences in Jamaica in his copious spare time and trying to compile his discography, which lengthens monthly.
