Documentary pays homage to scratch band icon ‘Jamesie’'

The Virgin Islands’ very own king of scratch, James “Jamesie” Brewster, lives on through hours of footage of interviews, performances and scenes of his everyday life, now available to watch for free on Columbia College Chicago’s website.

Brewster headed the scratch music band Jamesie and the All Stars alongside band members Camille “King Derby” Macedon, Lawrence “Trashy” Mason, Paul Hosford, Wilfred E. “Junie Bomba” Allick, Jr., Sylvester Ivan “Blinky” McIntosh, Dimitri “Pikey” Copemann and Raymond “Hoofa” Richards. Scratch music — also known as quelbe music —is native to the Caribbean. Documentarian Andrea Leland describes it in a press release as “a form of oral history: its lyrics are used to immortalize significant historical events, spread ‘rude’ gossip about one’s neighbors, and relay the day-to-day trials and tribulations on a small island.”

Leland, a documentarian and part-time St. Johnian who focuses on telling stories in Latin America and the Caribbean, is responsible for the hours of footage Columbia College Chicago made available. She shot the archived footage when making a documentary on Brewster titled “Jamesie, King of Scratch,” released in 2006. Scratch music sparked an interest for Leland, as she had listened to scratch music performed on other Caribbean islands. However, she said she found it to be less commonplace in the Virgin Islands, which she blames on American “cultural imperialism” in the territory. “American music and stateside cultural dominance overshadowed the local scratch band music, and I felt that it needed attention,” Leland told The Daily News. As a documentarian, she aims to highlight voices and cultures that aren’t in the spotlight. Therefore, she made it her duty to “amplify the voices of this Indigenous music.”