Hazel Ramsay-McClune
Laura Tanna, Contributor
WHAT MAKES Hazel Ramsay-McClune so special is that through her innate musical ability and apprenticeship with the old-time carriers of traditional culture, she not only has firsthand knowledge of Kumina, Dinki Mini, Revival, Nine Night Set-Up, Burru, Bruckins, Gerreh, Ettu, Jonkunu and Quadrille, she can share that knowledge with others in practical demonstrations and workshops.
Part One on Ms Ramsay-McClune, Field Research Officer at the African/Caribbean Institute of Jamaica/Jamaica Memory Bank [ACIJ/JMB], described her family background in Rose Town and Trench Town and how she came to transcribe the lyrics of folk songs collected by Olive Lewin, her caring mentor over the years. That relationship led Ramsay-McClune to an involvement with the Jamaica Folk Singers. Says Hazel:
"My first trip abroad was to Miami and I was so elated and excited, to go abroad with the Folk Singers, not to sing, just to do costumes. My first debut on stage was on one of these trips to New York. Dr. Lewin was the Revival Mother. They asked me to do the part. I knew it by going to rehearsals and listening. I didn't have to sing, just do the movements being in control of the band of people. Then they decided to demonstrate Jonkunu on stage, how to carry the house and that was my movement on stage. One day Vibart Seaforth, God rest his soul, said: 'You know Hazel can sing.' I was just being shy because I'd never thought of singing with the Jamaica Folk Singers. Eight persons and the beautiful sound that was being created! We have about 30 persons now. It gradually expanded."
Although the Folk Singers have travelled to many countries, Hazel remembers with awe their trip to England in 1986: "We were told we would be singing in Westminster Abbey and, Oh my God, I'd seen this place in books. I'd watched on television Kings and Queens getting married in this place. And here I am singing! It was incredible. We sang Holy Mount Zion and let me tell you, when we heard the sound in the cathedral - FABULOUS!!"
When Olive Lewin parted ways with the School of Music and the Folk Music Research Project there and joined the Social Development Commis-sion (SDC) in the mid-1970s, she headed a team of people and included Ramsay-McClune in that group as a Cultural Officer. Hazel remembers:
"My work at SDC entailed teaching Jamaica's young people about their culture through music and dance." In the division Jackie Guy was responsible for dance, Oliver Samuels for drama, Tony Redwood for marching bands and Janet Enright played the guitar, according to Hazel. The team worked in different areas, usually at community centres. Hazel says:
"You'd have the youth camp at Christiana, go down to Porus in the afternoon and come back all the way to Kingston in the evening." She has special praise for Daphne Davis in Westmoreland who would often put the team up in her own home so that they would work all weekend with various groups. She remembers: "The Hatfield Singers was one of the groups that started from scratch. We visited most of the prisons, teaching them to play guitar, drama, even the prison wardens were involved."
From one job to the next, Hazel says: "I didn't just go with a tape recorder. I made it a part of me to be a part of what I'm seeing and be involved with it." In essence, she apprenticed herself to people practising old-time traditions, then passed that knowledge on to others with whom she was working. She developed a network of contacts, sometimes bringing old-time performers in for young people to meet and sometimes taking young people to the source. For example, of Revivalism she says: "We'd bring a group in to see Kapo and he was willing to share. We'd just sit at his feet and learn at his church in Trench Town.
"Something started happening within SDC," she remembers, "and people started leaving." Olive Lewin joined the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) and Hazel was seconded from SDC to the OPM in the early 1980s where she became deeply involved in The Jamaica Memory Bank. She married in 1984 and masks any residue of heartache with wry wit: "What can I say? My husband went abroad. He said he was going to play dominoes and I think he's still playing because he hasn't been back. He left for Canada. I never heard from him again. After he left and I realised that he wasn't coming back, I went head on into whatever I was doing. I got more involved with the work. I got more involved with church. I got more involved with helping others." She takes great joy in her talented son, Kent Hewitt Bryan, a freelance sound engineer who makes CDs for artistes.
When the short-lived Institute of Folk Culture and the Jamaica Memory Bank were merged with the African Caribbean Institute of Jamaica in the early 1990s, Dr. Lewin left and continued her cultural contribution to the country in various ways, including her work at Grace, Kennedy. Hazel Ramsay-McClune remained with the ACIJ/JMB as the Field Research Officer. Today there is not one parish of Jamaica in which she has not worked, documenting and preserving the country's heritage for others, and only one remote village to which she still wants to go - Maroon Town in St. James.
She is proud of her part in helping to collect over 1,000 audio cassettes and some videos of Jamaican oral history and customs which are preserved and indexed at the ACIJ/JMB JMB but says: "I was hoping that with the amount of work that we put into the Memory Bank - documenting our history through talking with people - that people would have done articles to make people more aware, because there is so much on these tapes. You might think that sitting and talking to a person is so much rambling and chat, but if you go through a tape, there is something there that you're going to hear that is unusual. Nobody knows they're there. They should be using them," she laments.
I have no doubt that one day many people will appreciate the treasure trove of cultural heritage embodied in the Jamaica Memory Bank tapes but I think you should also be aware that there is a very special person named Hazel Ramsay-McClune whose practical knowledge of Jamaican heritage today makes her a rare treasure.
