World of Jamaican Music

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An illustrated map of the creators of Jamaican music and how they are connected.

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Beverley Kelso

Artist. Ska

Active
1963-1965
Sunrise
April 5, 1948, Kingston, Jamaica

Beverley Kelso sang backing vocals in the original Wailers until 1965 and is the last surviving member of that lineup.

She sang with Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Bunny Livingston, Junior Braithwaite, and Cherry Smith (also known as Cherry Green), though the accounts differ on when she joined, and sang on the Studio One sessions for Coxsone Dodd that produced "Simmer Down" and the records around it. Her high voice, with Braithwaite's, provided the harmony the group needed, there and on the hits "It Hurts to Be Alone" and "Lonesome Feeling." Though the youngest, she was its confidante: Marley told her things and asked her advice, and she helped make the connection to Rita Anderson that led to the Soulettes' "Opportunity." She left late in 1965, after recording "Let the Lord Be Seen in You," citing the direction the group was taking, and she put her own total at twenty-five songs. The group is said to have dedicated "Donna" to her in an attempt to keep her, and replacing her proved hard. She later settled in Brooklyn. In 2012 she said she intended to write about her time in the group.

Her place in the story has been argued over. In 2024 the manager Copeland Forbes called it a travesty that she had been left out of accounts of the group's formation. She was in the room for the first sessions in every version.

Last updated November 4, 2026

Connections

Notes

  1. Turner writes that the deaths of Marley, Tosh, Braithwaite, Cherry Smith, and Bunny Wailer have "left Kelso as the only surviving founding member": Anthony Turner, "Beverley Kelso of Wailers Fame to Be Honoured," Jamaica Gleaner, May 19, 2022, http://past.jamaica-gleaner.com/article/entertainment/20220519/beverley-kelso-wailers-fame-be-honoured.
  2. Barrow and Dalton place Kelso and "Cherry Green" as the two backing singers in the group that first came together in Trench Town in 1961: Steve Barrow and Peter Dalton, The Rough Guide to Reggae, 3rd ed. (London: Rough Guides, 2004), 38. Turner writes instead that she joined "in 1963, when, at age 14, Marley asked her mother to let her be a part of The Wailers": Turner, "Beverley Kelso of Wailers Fame to Be Honoured." Roy Black describes the group that went to Studio One as a quintet with Kelso as "the lone female": Roy Black, "The Music Diaries: Lone Female Wailer Played Integral Role in Original Group," Jamaica Gleaner, May 21, 2017, http://past.jamaica-gleaner.com/article/entertainment/20170521/music-diaries-lone-female-wailer-played-integral-role-original-group. Katz gives a third account: Kelso, "another neighbourhood hopeful who had impressed the group at a talent contest a few days earlier," replaced Cherry Green at the group's first recording session for Dodd: David Katz, "Cherry Green," Guardian, November 20, 2008, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2008/nov/20/popandrock.
  3. On the first Studio One session in late 1963 and "Simmer Down," Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 38; Black, "Lone Female Wailer." Katz says that debut session "yielded the hit Simmer Down": Katz, "Cherry Green."
  4. Black, "Lone Female Wailer," which names the four songs of the first session; a related text appears as "Beverley Kelso Gave the Wailers That Sound," accessed November 4, 2026, https://clintonlindsay.com/2014/03/30/beverley-kelso-gave-the-wailers-that-sound, which credits her "high-pitched background vocals."
  5. Black, "Lone Female Wailer."
  6. "Beverley Kelso Gave the Wailers That Sound"; Black, "Lone Female Wailer."
  7. Turner says she "sang on more than two dozen songs by the group, up until her departure in 1965" and moved to the United States in 1979: Turner, "Beverley Kelso of Wailers Fame to Be Honoured." On Brooklyn, "Beverley Kelso," Wikipedia, accessed October 1, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beverley_Kelso.
  8. "Beverley Kelso," Wikipedia.
  9. Turner and Wikipedia both call her a founding member: Turner, "Beverley Kelso of Wailers Fame to Be Honoured." "Beverley Kelso," Wikipedia. Forbes said she "was part of the foundation and creation of the Wailers" and that she felt "totally forgotten": Claudia Gardner, "Copeland Forbes Says Omission of Beverly Kelso's Contribution to Formation of Bob Marley & The Wailers a Travesty," DancehallMag, February 3, 2024, https://dancehallmag.com/?p=78416.

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