Oswald “Count Ossie” Williams virtually created Rasta nyabinghi drumming. Ossie’s journey as a musician began in 1949, through teaching sessions with a burru hand drum stylist named Brother Job. Burru was an underground sect that kept alive a particular African retention in Jamaican music culture involving hand drumming. Eventually, Count Ossie developed such outstanding skills that he became a master hand drummer and creator of innovative drumming based on burru that is today considered Rasta music or nyabinghi. Ossie’s profile as a highly talented musician and Rastafari sage was so prominent that he was a magnet, pulling interested Jamaicans of various races and classes to his humble Adastra Road Rasta camp in East Kingston. The artistry of Count Ossie and his hand drum ensemble was officially recognised by political leaders in government and in the parliamentary opposition during the ’60s. In fact, when Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia visited Jamaica in 1966, Count Ossie was one of a select group of Rasta leaders who was allowed to meet with the Emperor. Count Ossie’s work was also admired by important figures in the jazz world. There is photographic evidence of Ossie meeting Duke Ellington when Ellington visited Jamaica in the early ’60s. The photograph shows the Duke standing beside the Count as the Count gives what appears to be an impromptu performance for a small gathering. - Klive Walker, Dubwise: Reasoning from the Reggae Underground
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