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‘He was greater than Bob Marley’: the shocking tale of Jamaican ska pioneer Don Drummond

Inspired by a boxing, DJing nun, the trombonist laid down the foundations of reggae – but he was also a schizophrenic who killed his girlfriend, Jamaica’s ‘rhumba queen’ Margarita. A new graphic novel retells their stories

Its alumni feature a Who’s Who of ska and reggae: both Gordon and Thornton studied there, along with founding Skatalite members Tommy McCook, Lester Sterling and Johnny “Dizzy” Moore; Cedric “IM” Brooks; Emmanuel “Rico” Rodriguez, whose trombone solo on the Specials’ Ghost Town Jerry Dammers described as the band’s “musical highpoint”; “Yellowman” Foster, and many others. Tall and thin – “Bones”, as the boys nicknamed her – Davies loved sport, including boxing; she would spar with the pupils in full habit, show them videos of fights and was pen pals with Sugar Ray Robinson. Illustration: Costantinos Pissourios (art) and Adam Reeves (text)As Drummond got older, his erratic behaviour became more extreme: he would eat soil and bananas dipped in sand (symptoms of pica, which is associated with schizophrenia), urinate on stage during shows and stand in the middle of busy streets of traffic with his arms outstretched.

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