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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Rita Marley

Artist. Ska, rocksteady, reggae

Active
1960s-
Sunrise
July 25, 1946

Rita Marley, born Alfarita Constantia Anderson on July 25, 1946, is a singer, a member of the I-Threes, and Bob Marley's widow, and for four decades was the head of his estate and the businesses built on it.

By the usual account she was born in Santiago de Cuba to Leroy Anderson and Cynthia "Beda" Jarrett and brought to Kingston as an infant. The Cuban birth has been questioned, among others by her mother-in-law, Cedella Booker, and she has said she was told of it but never traced it. After her parents separated she was raised in Trench Town by her aunt Viola.

With her cousin Constantine "Dream" Walker and Marlene "Precious" Gifford she formed the Soulettes, who recorded for Coxsone Dodd at Studio One. Dodd set Bob Marley to coach them, which is how the two met. The Soulettes' records include "Time for Everything," a version of "Turn! Turn! Turn!," and sides with the Wailers singing harmony, and her solo cover of "Pied Piper" appeared in 1966. She married Marley in February 1966, shortly before he left to work in Wilmington, Delaware; while he was away Walker, now as Vision Walker, took his place in the Wailers with Rita singing harmony. When Bunny Wailer was jailed in 1968 she stood in for him for some months, and that April Danny Sims signed her, Bob, and Peter Tosh to management, publishing, and production contracts with JAD. The JAD sessions produced records credited to Bob, Rita and Peter and a dozen tracks with her voice on them, most unissued until the Freedom Time set of 2003.

From 1974 she was one of the I-Threes with Marcia Griffiths and Judy Mowatt, brought in to replace the harmony lost when Tosh and Bunny Wailer left, and she sang on every Wailers album from Natty Dread onward. The Rough Guide says their voices "blended seamlessly"; she put the job this way: "A lead voice shines best when the proper backdrop setting is in place." On December 3, 1976, two days before the Smile Jamaica concert, gunmen attacked the house at 56 Hope Road; she was shot in the head and survived, and she was on stage beside her husband at the concert.

After Bob Marley's sunset in May 1981 she took charge of the family businesses. That year Ken Khouri's Federal Records, the island's first pressing plant, passed to the Marleys and became Tuff Gong International at 220 Marcus Garvey Drive. In 1986 she turned the Hope Road house into the Bob Marley Museum. She founded and chairs the Robert Marley Foundation, the Bob Marley Trust, and the Bob Marley Group of Companies, and oversaw the early career of her children as Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers.

Her own albums began with Who Feels It Knows It, issued on Tuff Gong and later on Shanachie and carrying "One Draw"; Harambe (1982), We Must Carry On (1988), and Sings Bob Marley... and Friends (2003) followed. With the I-Threes she made Beginning (1986) for Tuff Gong and EMI, and she sang with the Wailers and Marcia Griffiths on John Denver's World Game (1983). Her memoir, No Woman No Cry: My Life with Bob Marley, written with Hettie Jones, appeared in 2004.

She has six children, among them Sharon, Cedella, Ziggy, and Stephen Marley. In 2000 she founded the Rita Marley Foundation, which built a home for the aged in Konkonuru, Ghana, the community where she settled, and supports its school; Ghana made her an honorary citizen in August 2013. She received the Order of Distinction in 1996 and the Order of Jamaica in 2019. She suffered a stroke in Miami in September 2016 and has kept a low profile since, appearing with Griffiths and Mowatt in March 2019 to accept an award for the I-Threes. Her eightieth birthday was marked with public celebrations in Kingston in July 2026.

Last updated November 5, 2026

Connections

Notes

  1. The Rough Guide gives "b. Alpharita Anderson, Kingston." Steve Barrow and Peter Dalton, The Rough Guide to Reggae, 3rd ed. (London: Rough Guides, 2004), 138. The full name and date are from "Rita Marley," Wikipedia, accessed October 5, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rita_Marley.
  2. "Rita Marley," Wikipedia. The family label, Rita Marley Music, issued the Melody Makers' early records. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 359.
  3. On the Cuban birth and Cedella Booker's doubts, "Rita Marley," Wikipedia. The Caribbean Camera repeats that she was "born in Cuba in 1946" and "taken to Jamaica as a toddler." "Rita Marley in Hospital After Suffering a Stroke," Caribbean Camera, September 29, 2016, https://thecaribbeancamera.com/rita-marley-in-hospital-after-suffering-a-stroke/. The Rough Guide gives Kingston as her birthplace. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 138.
  4. "Rita Marley," Wikipedia, citing her memoir. The Caribbean Camera says she grew up in Greenwich Town. "Rita Marley in Hospital."
  5. The Rough Guide names the Soulettes and her cousin Constantine "Dream" Walker. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 79. On Gifford and Dodd's coaching arrangement, "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  6. "Rita Marley & The Chorus - Pied Piper / Its Alright," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/release/6715808 (Studio One); "Rita Marley - Pied Piper / Its Alright," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/master/803938 (Rio, UK). The Soulettes' songs are listed in "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  7. The Rough Guide notes the "newly married Rita Marley" among those who welcomed Haile Selassie in April 1966. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 78. On the wedding date, Delaware and Vision Walker, "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  8. Danny Sims recalled meeting Bob, Rita and Peter Tosh through Johnny Nash in 1966. Lloyd Bradley, This Is Reggae Music: The Story of Jamaica's Music (New York: Grove Press, 2001), 405. On Bunny Wailer's jailing and the April 1968 contracts, "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  9. Bradley describes "an album with them called Bob, Rita, Peter," cut in 1968 while Bunny was in jail. Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 407. JAD issued "Bend Down Low"/"Mellow Mood" as a single credited to Bob, Rita and Peter. "Bob, Rita & Peter - Bend Down Low / Mellow Mood," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/master/928461. On "Freedom Time," "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  10. The Rough Guide: "The I-Threes took the place of Bunny and Peter's harmonies on Natty Dread." Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 139; see also 138.
  11. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 138. Larson Sutton, "5 Questions with Rita Marley, Lioness of Reggae," Reggaeville, May 6, 2019, https://www.reggaeville.com/artist-details/rita-marley/news/view/5-questions-with-rita-marley-lioness-of-reggae.
  12. The Rough Guide dates the attack to December 3, two days before the December 5 concert. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 139. On her wound and her place on stage, "Rita Marley," Wikipedia. In Steffens's oral history Judy Mowatt recalls that she and Rita "had been going to rehearsals," and Tyrone Downie that after the shooting Rita "had a bullet in her head": Roger Steffens, "The Night Bob Marley Got Shot," Rolling Stone (Australia), July 10, 2017, https://au.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/the-night-bob-marley-got-shot-1877, an excerpt from Roger Steffens, So Much Things to Say: The Oral History of Bob Marley (New York: W. W. Norton, 2017).
  13. "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  14. "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  15. On the Melody Makers and the 1982 single "What a Plot" on Rita Marley Music, Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 359.
  16. The Rough Guide calls "One Draw" her "1981 herb anthem," her first hit, after covers of early Wailers songs including "Who Feels It Knows It." Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 200. Discogs dates "Who Feels It Knows It" to 1980 on Tuff Gong and 1982 on Shanachie, "Harambe" to 1982, "We Must Carry On" to 1991, and "Sings Bob Marley... and Friends" to 2003. "Rita Marley - Who Feels It Knows It," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/master/143522; "Rita Marley - Harambe," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/master/143519; "Rita Marley - We Must Carry On," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/master/434595; "Rita Marley - Sings Bob Marley... And Friends," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/release/4841776.
  17. "I-Three - Beginning," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/master/441277; the "World Game" track on John Denver's "It's About Time" credits the Wailers, the I-Threes, Rita Marley and Marcia Griffiths. "John Denver - It's About Time," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/release/3053529.
  18. "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  19. "Rita Marley," Wikipedia. See also "Rita Marley in Hospital."
  20. "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  21. "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  22. The Caribbean Camera reported that she suffered the stroke on a visit to Miami "to attend a special event." "Rita Marley in Hospital." On the March 9, 2019, award from the Jamaica Reggae Industry Association, "Rita Marley," Wikipedia.
  23. "Grand Day-Long Celebrations for Rita Marley's 80th," Jamaica Observer, July 29, 2026, https://www.jamaicaobserver.com/2026/07/29/grand-day-long-celebrations-rita-marleys-80th/.

World of Jamaican Music: the whole map