Q&A
Soul Jazz’s Stuart Baker on Studio One
What was the thinking behind the selections?
It’s a combination of musical, intellectual and emotional processes functioning all at once. I see Rastafarianism as a faith based on a magical presumption (that Haile Selassie, crowned king of Ethiopia in 1930, is God). From believing this idea, Rastafarians are able to emotionally and intellectually throw off the shackles of colonialism and a past history of slavery – to reinvent themselves as proud lions rather than victims.