Leslie Kong

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Leslie Kong (20 December 1933 – 9 August 1971) was a Jamaican reggae producer. Kong was born into a Chinese-Jamaican family. He had a "relatively comfortable upbringing" and attended St. George's College in Kingston. Leslie and his two older brothers Cecil and Lloyd ran a restaurant, ice cream parlour and record shop called Beverley's in Orange Street, Kingston. In 1961, he encountered a young Jimmy Cliff outside of his shop singing a song he had written called "Dearest Beverley", in the hopes that the mention of the establishment would convince Kong to record him. This encounter led Kong to launch his own record label, Beverley's, and to record Cliff's song, launching Cliff's career in the process. Cliff took on an A&R role for the label, and brought Bob Marley to Kong's attention. In 1962, Kong recorded Marley's first single: "One Cup of Coffee" and "Judge Not", and Jimmy Cliff's first hit, "Miss Jamaica". Kong, known in Jamaican music circles as "the Chinaman", quickly established himself as the island's leading producer of local popular music. Throughout the 1960s Kong kept recording many leading Jamaican artists from ska to reggae through rocksteady including Joe Higgs, Desmond Dekker, Toots & the Maytals, Derrick Morgan, John Holt and Stranger Cole.