From the first time that he came to Kenya over a decade ago, Christopher Martin, a reggae and dancehall singer, has been coming back because he considers Kenya another home.
We met at Nairobi’s Movenpick Hotel where he was stealing naps just before his performance last August at Uhuru Gardens, to talk about his journey music.
He talks with the mellow timbre of his singing voice that has produced some of the most controversial love songs of the modern music era and our conversation is only broken by off-record wit. Christopher comes with an exuberant package of life that is hard to cloak.
He grew up in the rural side of Jamaica in a parish called St Catherine. He classifies himself as a country youth who started singing in church which was where he knew he could sing.
This was, however, no strange thing for him, as he comes from a family of singers where his mother father and brother can all sing.
“I started singing in church and then went to high school, where I continued singing with a group of friends. I entered a singing competition in Jamaica in 2005 which I won, this was in my last year in high school. That was the start of my music career,” he says.
His parents were supportive of his music career.
“My parents are Christians and always supported me going to different churches and singing gospel music, but when I started singing secular music, it was just a big change but they always supported me without restricting me to gospel music. Even now my mother listens to my music and so I have to keep it clean, 99 percent of my songs have to be clean.”
Compare to his fellow Jamaican greats. Christopher’s music has been dynamic in terms of his steady rise into the industry, which has seen him release hit song after hit song but this has not deterred his ambition or hunger and passion for music.
“There is still more for me to achieve in my musical career.
