With its roots already growing in New York, the seven-year old Coalition to Preserve Reggae Music (CPR) has finally been introduced to the Jamaican public.

On Tuesday October 11, during a press conference at the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts in Kingston, CPR’s chairperson Sharon Gordon and the organisation’s president Carlyle McKetty introduced CPR to those in attendance. Gordon explained that CPR started seven years ago after they saw reggae music going in the wrong direction.

“It has grown by leaps and bounds. We started off as a group of friends, industry folk who were concerned with where the music was going and what was happening at the time. There were a lot of negative stories coming out. We didn’t know what to do, we were just frustrated,” she said.
Gordon also explained that around the same time, Emperor Haile Selassie’s coronation was coming up, so a decision was made to host a concert. The event, Reggae Culture Salute, has become the organisation’s flagship event. Describing the first show as a huge success, Gordon said it was followed by fora and workshops.

CPR is a charitable organisation that works to preserve the art form and its traditional message of healing and unity. The mission of the Coalition is to raise the bar in the creation, development, promotion and presentation of reggae music, to elevate the profile of its purveyors and to research, codify, curate and disseminate information about the genre in order to increase understanding of its development, significance and influence around the world.

Read more at:Â The Jamaica Gleaner