At its most powerful, music tells a story and takes the listener on a journey to another place or time. Such is the case with the music of Toronto based reggae artist/producer Damion Knight aka Dami. In his single ‘At Last’ featuring world renowned saxophonist Dean Fraser, Dami’s voice and musical arrangement will bring you to the beaches of Jamaica and saturate your senses with pleasures that awaken, mend and nurture the soul. This is the trend of the music from his forthcoming album All in the Key of Love. Staying true to his Jamaican background and infusing soul, R&B and jazz into his work, Dami has created his own style of Reggae Soul.

Born Clayton Damion Solomon, he was born and raised in the small town of Lionel Town in the parish of Clarendon, Jamaica. Growing up without a father for most of his life and not many material goods, his mother always encouraged Dami and his brother to use their imaginations. “We never really had much in terms of toys, so we really had to use our imaginations. I am most thankful for this because it forced me to be creative and be imaginative and find new activities each day to keep us occupied.” Another thing Dami is thankful for is that his mother filled their house with love and music. “I remember growing up and dancing with my mother; she was a big music lover and was always singing and playing love songs or Motown in the house during the day.” At night, the heavy bass of the reggae coming from the dancehall behind his house would send him off to bed, and so it seems even in his sleep, he was listening to music. With music all around him, Dami quickly became obsessed with all things music. He was especially drawn to musical instruments and would make guitars out of fish wire and sardine cans and would want to try and play every piano he came across. Always the entertainer, when his mother had company, Dami would perform impersonations of his musical inspiration, Michael Jackson, for them and later as a teenager he started djaying, the Jamaican equivalent to rapping.

Armed with creativity and an independent nature and fuelled by wanting to learn more about music but no one around to teach him, Dami would eventually learn to play the piano and guitar on his own. Always seeking to own his creative process, he has also taught himself to produce and engineer all of his music, which he writes himself, in the studio he built himself. For this singer, songwriter and producer, music is about storytelling and connecting with the audience. “I most enjoy the storytelling. Musicians have a platform of sometimes only 3 minutes to tell a story whereas an author can have many pages. As musicians we have a short span of time to capture the heart and captivate the mind.” Singing about the ups and downs of everyday life is what makes his music so relatable even to those who are not avid listeners of his genre. Dami’s ability to convey his story, his vision and his sense of rhythm embodies the idea that life is good, no matter the struggles we may face. “I haven’t had the perfect life, so I can feel and understand what people go through and translate that feeling into music. I can really sympathize and empathize with the struggles of mankind and it’s important that music talks about the human experience and has some relevance in that way.”

All in the Key of Love will be an album of love songs. “The album will feature classic reggae love songs from a period when I believe music was real,” says Dami, “and will also feature touches of our modern era.” The album will be a showcase of Dami’s interpretation of what music is and represents in his life. It will also feature many of Canada’s top musicians, not just limited to this genre. With this album, his aim is to show the world that reggae music coming out of Canada can compete with the best in a genre that Canada has yet to make a significant imprint. With the sweet sound created in his small studio, one cannot even imagine the limits of this young man’s potential – and this is just the beginning.

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