Zowie, How great “Z” art?

He may be the youngest musical producer in this country but he has the expertise of making music far beyond his years.

Zowie “Great Z” Stapleton is definitely a cut above the rest and when it comes to what he does, from listening to his work, he does it well.{{more}}

His friends say that he is similar to US entertainment mogul, Russell Simmons, the man behind a lot of popular entertainment like HBO DEF Poetry, where he doesn’t go about with fan fare, doesn’t “bling” or isn’t perceived as being flashy. They describe him as a guy who humbly goes about his everyday business (literally) and always has ideas.

Great Z has been making hits with local artistes like Skinny Fabulous, Sergeant Bread, Full Clip and Bunny Rebel for years, and his musical talent has made regional artistes sit up and take notice. Peter Ram from Barbados and Bunji Garlin from Trinidad are just two of the regional acts that have done tracks with him.

When asked how he comes up with such musical notes to make his songs, he answered, “It just comes, sometimes the ideas come in my dreams, I would be sleeping and a musical note would just pop into my head. So I wouldn’t say that I set out to build a rhythm. But I believe that practice makes perfect.” While growing up in the 80’s Great Z was around musical geniuses such as Dwight and Frankie Mc Intosh. He also credits local legend DJ, Jude “The Cool” Dude for being influential.

He has had some piano lessons but his ear for music comes naturally. With this desire he started a rap group in 1992 called “Rap Stallions” and later formed “Spook Hall” in 2000. He went even further by opening his own music studio at Arnos Vale, called “The Panic Room Studio”, and a production company called “Hysyanz Production.”

He can be described as a musical pioneer when no one else was really accepting or trying to produce local dance hall artistes.

But Great Z for 2005 is showing that he also has skills as a performer.

He relaesed the songs “Slow Mo” and “Fill you with my love” which he hopes to take international. He has also for this year sang in the Upstage Calypso tent with his tune called “Stock.” He explained, “I entered the calypso competition to show that I have versatility. It was about the art and about getting young blood into the culture, which seems to be taken up by only older calypsonians. We entered to spark change to participate and to show that young people have an interest in calypso. We are not just trying to change it but they are adding flavour to it.”