>
Best viewed in 1024 x 768
BONUS BOB MARLEY: WANT MORE MIX
THE NEW YORK TIMES
By JON PARELES
Augustus Pablo, a widely influential reggae producer, died on Tuesday (May 18,1999) at University Hospital in Kingston, Jamaica. He was 46 and lived in the hills outside Kingston. The cause was myasthenia gravis, a nerve disorder, said his brother, Garth Swaby. Mr. Pablo, whose original name was Horace Swaby, was known for what he called the ''Far East sound'': haunting, minor-key tunes with sparse lines for melodica (a harmonica with a keyboard) floating above deep bass lines and echoing keyboards. He was an architect of dub reggae, music in which deep bass lines and dizzying echo effects envelop a few shards of melody.
Born in Kingston in 1953, he became a Rastafarian while still a teen-ager; he also taught himself to play piano. Bob Marley brought him into the studio to play keyboards on early Wailers recordings, and he began working regularly as a session musician in the late 1960's. He joined the house band at Randy's Studio, a leading Kingston studio.
A friend introduced him to the melodica, and he took it into the studio when he had his first recording sessions as a leader in 1969 with the producer Herman Chin-Loy. His first single, ''Iggy Iggy,'' was credited to Augustus Pablo, a name Mr. Chin-Loy used for instrumentals. When Mr. Adams moved to the United States in 1971, he left the Pablo name to Mr. Swaby. With his next single, ''East of the River Nile,'' Mr. Swaby as Augustus Pablo inaugurated the Far East sound, and he followed it with his first major Jamaican hit, ''Java,'' in 1972. While making solo recordings, often reworking of past and present hits, he was also in demand as a studio musician, and he worked for a dozen leading Jamaican producers in the early 70's. In 1972 he started running his own labels, including Hot Stuff, Rockers International, Yard and Message. Mr. Pablo produced recordings for singers, notably Junior Delgado, Jacob Miller and Hugh Mundell, and he released instrumentals under his own name.
Those instrumentals are cornerstones of modern dub reggae, particularly those he recorded in the mid-70's, including the albums ''King Tubby Meets Rockers Uptown'' (a 1976 album of Pablo instrumentals remixed by the engineer and producer King Tubby) and ''East of the River Nile'' from 1978.
Mr. Pablo rarely toured; his milieu was the recording studio. He had hits in Jamaica as Junior Delgado's producer in the mid-80's, and he continued releasing his own instrumental recordings well into 90's, adding digital technology to his older style.
In addition to his brother, he is survived by his companion, Karen Scott; a son, Addis; a daughter, Isis; a sister, Claudia Swaby McBean, and his mother, Buelah Swaby.
photo from Peter Dyche
