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's

Studio. Ska, rocksteady, reggae

Active
1961-1971

Beverley's was a restaurant, ice cream parlour, and record shop at 135a Orange Street in downtown Kingston, run by Leslie Kong with his brothers, and after 1961 the name of the record label Kong operated from it.

The label began with Jimmy Cliff, who sang a song called "Dearest Beverley" outside the shop in the hope that the title would get him an audition. It worked, and Kong began recording. Cliff then took on an informal A&R role, and he and Derrick Morgan brought a teenaged Bob Marley to Kong. In 1962 Kong recorded Marley's first songs, "Judge Not," "One Cup of Coffee," and "Terror," the second issued under the name Bobby Martell.

Kong reached his peak with early reggae and was, in the Rough Guide's phrase, "one of the first producers to make inroads into the international pop market"; Cliff later said he made the most international hits of the producers of his day. Desmond Dekker's "Israelites" was the first Jamaican record to top the British singles chart, in 1969, and reached the American top ten. Toots and the Maytals, the Melodians, the Gaylads, Ken Boothe, Delroy Wilson, Derrick Morgan, and Bruce Ruffin all recorded for the label, backed by a session group billed as the Beverley's All-Stars. The Rough Guide calls Kong "the consummate professional," insisting on a "clean" sound and bouncy commercial rhythms, and suggests that this is why roots fans have underrated him. His most consistent Jamaican hitmakers were the Maytals, who came back from Toots Hibbert's jail term with "54-46 That's My Number" and went on to a run of records for the label; they, Cliff, the Melodians, the Pioneers, and Dekker all reached the British pop charts. The Melodians' "Rivers of Babylon," with an understated accompaniment featuring Ernest Ranglin and Larry McDonald, narrowly missed but was a massive underground hit.

In 1970 Kong issued a Wailers compilation titled The Best of the Wailers over the group's objections. Accounts differ as to whether Bunny Wailer or Peter Tosh delivered it, but one of them is said to have told Kong that releasing the record would kill him. Kong departed in August 1971, about a year later, at thirty-seven; the cause was a heart attack. He appears in a cameo in The Harder They Come, overseeing a session, and did not live to see the film released.

Last updated November 4, 2026

Connections

Notes

  1. On the address, the business, and the Kong brothers, Steve Barrow and Peter Dalton, The Rough Guide to Reggae, 3rd ed. (London: Rough Guides, 2004), 107; Bradley describes "a combined ice-cream parlour, cosmetics boutique and record shop": Lloyd Bradley, This Is Reggae Music: The Story of Jamaica's Music (New York: Grove Press, 2001), 104. Bradley dates Kong's move into production to 1963 (104), but Cliff, quoted by Bradley, puts the first session "in late 1961 or early 1962" (105); Barrow and Dalton say late 1961: Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 32.
  2. In Derrick Morgan's account, the first session produced Owen Gray's "Darling Patricia," Morgan's "Be Still" and "Sunday Monday," and Cliff's "Hurricane Hattie": "We didn't do 'Dearest Beverley' yet." Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 32. Cliff's own account of singing "Dearest Beverley" in the shop is in Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 104-5.
  3. The books give two versions. Cliff, quoted by Bradley, says he was Kong's "A&R man," second to Morgan, and that Marley came to Beverley's where Cliff picked his songs: Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 399-400. Morgan, quoted by Barrow and Dalton, says his girlfriend introduced Marley to him in February 1962 and that he brought him to Kong: Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 34.
  4. Barrow and Dalton date the three songs to between February and April 1962 and say "One Cup of Coffee" was issued as by Bobby Martell: Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 34. Cliff recalled that "Terror" was never released: Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 400.
  5. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 107. On Cliff's remark, Howard Campbell, "When Kong Was King," Jamaica Observer, March 29, 2022, https://jamaicaobserver.com/2022/03/29/when-kong-was-king. Wikipedia says he became "the island's leading producer of local popular music": "Leslie Kong," Wikipedia, accessed October 1, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leslie_Kong.
  6. Bradley calls "Israelites" "the first reggae number 1" in Britain: Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 241. Barrow and Dalton note that it reached number 9 in the US, "the first Jamaican-recorded song to break into the US chart": Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 107.
  7. On the Maytals, Melodians, Pioneers, Dekker, Wailers, Ken Boothe, Delroy Wilson, and the Gaylads at Beverley's, Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 225. Barrow and Dalton's survey of Kong compilations adds "the criminally underrated Bruce Ruffin": Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 108. On the All-Stars' personnel, "Leslie Kong," Wikipedia.
  8. Barrow and Dalton describe Kong as "insisting on a 'clean' sound and bouncy commercial rhythms": Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 107.
  9. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 107.
  10. Barrow and Dalton date the Wailers material to 1969: Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 107. Wikipedia gives May 1970 for the recording and August 1, 1971, for the album's release, which would put Kong's death about a week after it: "The Best of the Wailers," Wikipedia, accessed October 1, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Best_of_the_Wailers.
  11. Colin Grant, relaying Bunny Wailer's own claim, writes that Kong "would 'not live to reap the rewards'": Colin Grant, "The Binoculars of Jah," Granta, December 21, 2016, https://granta.com/the-binoculars-of-jah/. Another account also has Bunny telling Kong that if he thought this was their best, "Kong would die soon": Willie Luncheonette, "Bunny Wailer," Tracking Angle, December 6, 2023, https://trackingangle.com/features/bunny-wailer.
  12. Barrow and Dalton give the cause as a heart attack in 1971, "when only in his late thirties": Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 107; see also Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 225. On August 1971 and his age, "Leslie Kong," Wikipedia.
  13. Wikipedia describes him playing a recording engineer in a studio scene: "Leslie Kong," Wikipedia.

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