Donovan Germain

Donovan Germain (born March 7, 1952 in Jamaica ) is a music producer . His Penthouse Studio and his labels , especially Germain and Penthouse Records , have been among Jamaica's major studios and labels since the early 1990s.

Life and work as a producer

Germain ran a record store in New York until he started working as a producer in 1972. The first reggae hits he produced include Mr. Boss Man with Cultural Roots (1980), Sugar Minott's Good Thing Going , which hit the UK singles chart in 1981, Freddie McGregor's Just Don't Wanna Be Lonely and One Dance Won't Do with Audrey Hall (1985).

In 1987 he opened his penthouse studio in Kingston . There he produced together with sound engineer Dave “Rude Boy” Kelly, quickly gained a high reputation for the quality of his recordings and became one of the most important producers in Jamaica. Many of the records recorded here appeared on his own labels, Germain and Penthouse Records , and numerous singles became hits in Jamaica. Penthouse became one of the top studios on the island and developed “a synonym for the most distinctive 'silicon chip reggae'”, that is, for the ragga, which was popular at the time and characterized by synthetic drum sounds . Germain was also a pioneer of the Combination Style , in which the toasting of a deejay to hard ragga rhythms in the verses alternated with a melodically sung chorus, in principle similar to U-Roy's legendary toasts over dub versions, only from the start as Duet conceived.

With the onset of the success of the Penthouse Studio , some hitherto unknown musicians who later made great careers received their first attention. Buju Banton should be mentioned here, who among other things broke all sales records in Jamaica with the album Mr. Mention produced by Germain and released by Penthouse in 1992, even surpassing those of Bob Marley . Artists like Wayne Wonder , Tony Rebel , Cutty Ranks and Mad Cobra also started their careers in the early 1990s in collaboration with Donavan Germain. Others, like Jah Mali or Assassin, also benefited from Germain's professionalism during their ascent. But Germain wasn't just newcomers to their careers - Beres Hammond , Marcia Griffiths and Nana McLean made their comeback with productions at Germain's studio and label.

In addition, Germain's studio was also a career springboard for some sound engineers and music producers who later opened their own labels, including Dave and Tony Kelly and Andre Tyrell.

In 2014 he was awarded the Musgrave Silver Medal for his life's work .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Rainer Bratfisch, Reggae-Lexikon , 1999, ISBN 3-89602-207-5
2. ↑ René Wynands, Do the Reggae , 1995. PDF version , p. 193f.
3. ↑ Record Producers - The Big 5 ( Memento of the original from March 13, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Jamaica Observer March 2, 2008. Retrieved April 27, 2009.  
4. ↑ IOJ honors Musgrave Awardees during Heritage Month. go-jamaica.com; accessed on October 23, 2014.

Web links

• Donovan Germain at Discogs (English)