PETER HUNNINGALE
Interview by Norman Darwen at Band On The Wall - Manchester, England

London based singer Peter Hunnigale is one of the leading lights of the
Reggae scene in Britain, though little known outside it. Before a show at Manchester's Band On The Wall he related something of his background:

PH: "I've always loved music from a youngster, for as long as I can remember. The music bug has always been in me. I mean, I couldn't express myself musically until I reached Secondary school which was the early seventies, where I was able to meet other people who thought like me, who had an interest in music. So the playing, the learning began at school for me, amongst a few other colleagues, some of whom I still work with today - people like Fitzroy 'Wizard' Blake who engineers at the Cave Studio for Jet Star Records, and a few other individuals, like Aswad's 'Bigga' Morrison and Vincent Nap and some of these guys, we go back many years. I had lots of influences from the Pop and the Reggae world, the Rolling Stones and stuff.

PH: That's what England had produced from its shores, and being born of Jamaican parentage, what we had back then was mainly Bluebeat and Ska and early forms of Reggae like Rocksteady. You had people like Desmond Dekker, Dave & Ansel Collins, Bob & Marcia, and early Bob stuff, a lot of Bob and the Wailers, Toots & the Maytals, many greats. Then growing up in young teenage years you progress on to people like Jacob Miller, still Bob Marley involved, Gregory Isaacs, the Mighty Diamonds, Delroy Wilson, many, many Reggae greats. We also had the influences of American soul music, the music coming from the Stax label, Isaac Hayes, Marvin Gaye, Curtis Mayfield, Smokey Robinson, the Temptations and all the other greats that from that world. There's enough influences there to help someone like myself, give myself some kind of focus as to what I want to achieve. Obviously Reggae being my first love, it's coming from the origin of my parents, so you know - first love. What I am today, I hope is an amalgam of all those influences. It's fuelled by the love for music anyway, so...

PH: Yeah, I went though those years when the DJs ruled, when it was really hard. People really didn't want to hear vocalists as such. You could team up, my DJ partner was Tippa Irie, still is today and so we went through the formula of DJ-Singer in order to get through to the market. So I went through that period but I stayed with it and come out the other end. It's gone back to the singer's market, so what helped me a lot was the staying power, going through the transition of the Reggae scene then the dancehall scene and then back to where we are today where Reggae is sort of coming back through as a music. All the elements that we know Reggae was about are sort of coming back in the music.

PH: It's an honour for me for someone to say that they think of me as perhaps one of the UK's leading Reggae artists. It's not something that I take for granted. I use the encouragement to try and make myself better. It is an honour and I respect the honour of people taking the time out to lend me their ear and for them to enjoy what I'm doing. So I'm really appreciative. =I can only say that I'll keep on trying to strive for the best. Maxi Priest? He's a great artist, there is no two ways about it. He can sing and he can write. He has good vibes. It is a pleasure working with Maxi, it doesn't matter, just working with him, he's got a good working attitude as well. He and I penned the song 'Best Of Me' for his compilation album 'Best Of Me'. Yeah, we enjoyed successes from that outing which was good, and when he's in town he will normally give me a phone call and come over, we do our thing, either design some tracks or whatever.

PH: People call me a Lovers Rock singer, yeah. To a degree, I will go with the term. For argument's sake, it's what we're known for from these shores. So I'm not happy to turn around and say, 'I'm not a Lovers Rock singer', but people listening say, 'Well, we know you're not a Lovers Rock singer but UK is lovers rock - and you're UK. No matter which way you look at it, you're still going to sing or present the same vibes that come from these shores. So respectfully, we know you're going to do roots and culture, we know you do a little bit of dub, you do a little bit of pop and R&B but you're still a Lover's Rock singer'. So I'm just cool about it. I just say, 'OK'. At the end of the day I think it's still a respectful sort of title." - Norman Darwen (Peace!)