Ska

Ska
Stylistic origins	Jamaican mento calypso jazz rhythm and blues
Cultural origins	Late 1950s, Jamaica
Typical instruments	Guitar bass guitar trumpet trombone saxophone piano Drum kit organ
Derivative forms	Rocksteady reggae
Fusion genres
2 Tone ska jazz ska pop ska punk spouge Christian ska
Regional scenes
Japan Australia United States United Kingdom

Ska is a popular music from Jamaica that began in the 1950s. Ska music that was first played at a slower tempo then became reggae in the late 1960s.

Ska music bands include singers, electric guitars, electric bass guitar, piano, organ, saxophone, trumpet, and trombone. In ska, the electric guitar and piano normally play short chords on the off-beat. If you go "one and two and three and four", the off-beat is the "and".

A ska singer does a style of Jamaican singing called "toasting." When a singer is "toasting", they make sounds, repeat words, invent rhymes, and shout into the microphone. The Jamaican "toasting" style of singing and talking was adapted into rap music in the 1980s.

How Ska musicians dress

Musicians who play ska dress in hats and suits. Many ska bands wear clothes with a chessboard pattern of black and white squares. Doc Martens are a common type of shoe. This pattern symbolizes the way that ska music mixes of Black and White musicans and styles of music.There was a British genre of ska-punk influenced by The Specials, Madness and the English Beat, that began to dress in kilts.

1980s Ska Revival

Even though ska was developed in the 1950s, it became popular again in the 1980s in Britain. In the 1980s, ska bands such as The Specials, The Selecter, The Beat, UB40 and Madness played ska music.

1990s Ska mixed with punk rock

In the 1990s, some bands mixed ska music with Punk rock to make ska-punk. This kind of ska music is from England and the United States. Some pop-punk bands from the 1990s mixed pop-punk with ska-punk.

Ska bands and singers

• No Doubt
• The Mighty Mighty Bosstones
• The Specials
• The Selecter (British band)
• The Beat (British band)
• Madness (English band)
• Sublime
• Prince Buster (Jamaican singer)
• Desmond Dekker (Jamaican singer)
• The Bodysnatchers (female British band)
• The Skatalites (Jamaican band)
• Streetlight Manifesto (American band)
• The Toasters (American band)
• The Slackers (New York City band)
• Rusted Root (American band)
• Westbound Train (Boston band)
• Reel Big Fish
• Suburban Legends (American band)
• Catch 22 (American band)
• Less Than Jake
• Lord Creator (Jamaican singer)
• The King Blues (British band)

Related pages

• Scat singing

Other websites

• Going to a Ska Show? Here's What to Wear (LA Weekly)