Sean Paul
Third performance. Coming to Uganda for the third time, Sean Paul the Jamaican Grammy Awards winning dancehall reggae artiste has an impressive music CV. When it comes to music he is on a roller coaster. And this year he walked down the aisle. Isaac Ssejjombwe writes about the King of Dancehall’s life in and out of the studio
Sean Paul Ryan Francis Henriques, 39 is a Jamaican recording artiste but also featured on RnB and hiphot tracks. His main emphasis is on his own sound. He says dancehall is the most underground music in the world though artistes in that category are most misrepresented. “Even though we have done it time and time again, some people still act like they don’t want to give reggae music a try. But this music is big in all corners now,” he says. It is for this reason that he likes Uganda because the people here understand what dancehall and reggae music is all about.
Family history
Born in Kingston, his Jamaica,parents Garth and Frances were both talented athletes. His mother is also a well-known painter. Sean Many members of his family are swimmers. His grandfather was on the first Jamaican men’s national water polo team. His father also played water polo for the team in the 1960s, and competed in long-distance swimming, while Sean Paul’s mother was a backstroke swimmer. Sean Paul played for the national water polo team from the age of 13 to 21, when he gave up the sport in order to launch his musical career.
The school lane
He attended the Wolmers High School for Boys, Belair School, Hillel Academy High School, and the College of Arts, Science, and Technology, now known as the University of Technology, where he was trained in commerce with a view to pursuing an occupation in hotel management.
Climbing the ladder of fame
He began writing his first riddims at 13, on a simple keyboard his mother gave him. By his mid-teens, he was writing lyrics that captured the attention of major reggae and dancehall men in Jamaica.
Sean Paul’s manager and producer Jeremy Harding first heard about the singer when his brother told him about seeing someone at a small open mic event in Kingston who sounded a lot like the popular dancehall DJ and toaster Super Cat.
Harding eventually met Sean Paul came by his (Harding) studio to ask for some advice. During the meeting, Sean Paul recorded a vocal over Harding’s rhythm track and in the process created the song Baby Girl.
He began hanging out at the studio every day, and the pair collaborated on several more tracks. When they recorded “Infiltrate” they decided they had something good enough to get on the radio.
But the Jamaican dancehall superstar first sparked the world in 2002 with his breakout hit, GimmeThe Light, which he followed up with the Grammy-winning classic album, Dutty Rock. He dropped the RIAA platinum smash The Trinity in 2005 which led off with the Top 10 single We Be Burnin’, followed by the smash hit Temperature.
Records
The Kingston-born artiste has already sold more than 10 million albums worldwide, and has become one of the most successful Jamaican artiste of all time on the U.S. charts – spurred by a trio of pop singles, and five top ten hits. Sean Paul and Shaggy, whose (1990s )hit single Angel, are the only Jamaican artistes to ever cross the 50 million mark on YouTube. On top of that, another single off the same album She Doesn’t Mind is closing in on 100 million views.
The Collabos
Sean Paul has a long history of recording hit duets – including the recent remix of Estelle’s Come on Over, preceded by Give It Up To Me with Keyshia Cole, Break It Off with Rihanna, Baby Boy with Beyonce, and Give It to You Girl with Eve. He has collabos with artistes like Akon, 50 Cent, The Clipse, Busta Rhymes and Blu Cantrell.
His worth
The Jamaican DJ and reggae singer is estimated to have a net worth of $11 million dollars according to Celebrity Networth website.
Relationships
He is married to Jodi “Jinx” Stewart, a well-known television presenter on RETV in Jamaica. They have been together since 2002 and he proposed to her in January 2011 and they got married in a private wedding in May 2012.
The couple exchanged vows in front of close family and friends at the small and intimate ceremony held at the Boone Hall Oasis, St Andrews in Jamaica on May 29 2012.
Sean Paul with wife Jodi “Jinx” Stewart. They got married in May this year.
The hairstyle
“I just felt the need for change, I liked it. To feel free and change the style is something everybody can do,” Sean Paul talks about sporting a mohawk for the release of his new album Tomahawk Technique. He describes it as a cutting edge blend of dancehall music with pop, dance and R&B. Dancehall superstar Sean Paul is best known for his maddeningly catchy hooks, his distinctive Jamaican lilt and ever-changing hairstyles that have run the gamut from bold to cornrows a mohawk.
The performances
In Africa, Sean Paul has performed in DR Congo, Senegal, Rwanda and South Africa including at the Big Brother Africa StarGame Launch. He has also preformed in various US states, Germany, Austria, Belgium, UK, France, Canada, Italy, Spain and Netherlands.
Sean Paul is slated to have his third show in Uganda this evening at Cricket Oval in a concert dubbed Sean Paul Live in concert courtesy of Club Music, a subsidiary of Club Beer.
The artiste made the announcement of his Kampala show at a recent Jamaican concert in Washington DC at Fillmore Silver Spring a few weeks ago. Entrance is Shs25,000 for the ordinary tickets and Shs75,000 for V.I.P.
