By ROB KENNER

In the 28 years since the death of Bob Marley, reggae has sought a new standard-bearer. Tarrus Riley, a 30-year-old Rastafarian singer-songwriter, is hardly the first to aspire to the role, but his name is already being mentioned with reggae’s biggest stars.

He possesses an expressive voice, as well as a knack for lyrics and melodies that capture the ups and downs of love and life - a new baby whose parents can’t sleep, a husband whose wife’s kisses have gone cold - in a way that is both familiar to his Jamaican audience and accessible to the world.

He’s also an irrepressibly cheerful personality, constantly cracking jokes, though he could hardly take his work more seriously. His mission, he said in a telephone interview, is to “preserve our culture,” by which he means reggae music and its attendant black-empowerment philosophies.

The dancehall sound that has dominated Jamaican music for two decades has become increasingly unintelligible to the rest of the world. Without bashing dancehall, Mr. Riley is leading a resurgence of traditional roots reggae.

In July he performed at Reggae Sumfest, the annual festival in Montego Bay, Jamaica, that showcases the biggest stars in rhythm and blues and hip-hop as well as the best local reggae artists. The lineup included Ne-Yo, whose hit single “Miss Independent” provided the backing track for Vybz Kartel and Spice’s X-rated dancehall smash “Rampin’Shop,” and a twin bill of Marley’s son Damian (Jr. Gong) Marley and the American rapper Nas.

The cross-cultural conversation between American and Jamaican musicians has been going on for half a century, resulting in, among other things, the creation of ska (by modifying American bebop) and hip-hop (by transplanting Jamaican sound-system dances to the Bronx). But as these innovations became marketable categories, reggae lost out on the American airwaves.

“We don’t like categories,” Mr. Riley said. “‘Cause then you get the separation and then you get the prejudice. Can’t take all of these boundaries, you know? I just like to make free music.”

Born in the Bronx and raised in Florida and Jamaica, Mr. Riley is the son of the reggae singer Jimmy Riley, who hit the British pop charts in 1982 with the ballad “Love and Devotion.”

But Tarrus Riley was a fan of pop music as well as reggae. “Everything influence me,” he said. “Rock, R&B - music influences music. I’m a lover of all melody, whatever the melody is.”

As he matured he embraced a more sensitive side. “My girl said, ‘Why don’t you go get a job?’/ That’s what she ask me every day,” he sings on the new song “It Will Come.” “‘You say you love me a lot/ But that can’t put food in a pot.’”

Still, his love of dancehall is as strong as his refusal to be typecast. “Good Girl Gone Bad,” the first single from his new album, “Contagious” (VP Records), features the young D.J. Konshens.

It’s difficult to unite the fractious reggae scene, but perhaps even more challenging to win a wider audience with traditional reggae.

But Mr. Riley seems undaunted. “We no really into the difficultness of nothing you know,” he said. “I’m a man that accept challenge. ”


Tarrus Riley is leading a revival of traditional reggae.