By Yasmine Peru – Senior Gleaner Writer—
Morna Dodd says she has no problem doing the DNA test, but wonders why she wasn’t told this 16 years ago when her father died.
Some 16 years after his death, the last will and testament of pioneering Studio One producer, Clement ‘Sir Coxsone’ Dodd, is still waiting to be actualized, as the case remains at the Office of the Administrator General.
One of his heirs, his daughter, Morna Dodd, told The Gleaner that she stood by her brother’s side for years as he battled in court for the right to his father’s estate, as Sir Coxsone had specifically stated in his will. Even though he won the court case in 2010, she saw her brother die before things could be made manifest.
Now, she says that the saga continues, as scientific proof of her relationship to Sir Coxsone is being requested. “I have no problem doing a DNA test, as there is absolutely no doubt who is my father. I look just like my Nan [Sir Coxsone’s mother], and my sons look like my father. But why wasn’t I told all of this 16 years ago, and how exactly will this DNA test be carried out?” a frustrated Dodd, who resides in England, asked of no one in particular. Except, perhaps, her cat, who she jokingly said has a “foot fetish”.
Her mother, Una Hutchinson, started out with Coxsone when he just went into business, and bore his first son, Clement Dodd Jr, as well as Morna, but Una left the producer because he was just too “girlie girlie”.
“My mom always said that she was too jealous, so she couldn’t live with my dad and him having all those other women,” Morna Dodd recalled. However, she has fond memories of living with her father and also her grandmother in Jamaica, before migrating to England as a child with her mother and siblings. She also recalls her father finding them wherever they moved to in England and showering them with love.
SCIENTIFIC PROOF
But Morna Dodd felt anything but love when the DNA request was made at a March 18 Zoom meeting with some of the parties concerned, including lawyers and a representative for the Administrator General’s Department. “I looked about getting my father’s name on my birth certificate, because we all know how it used to be back in the day, and sometimes even now. So, at that meeting, I was instructed that I needed to inform all my siblings what I was doing. And that was when my sister’s lawyer said that they needed scientific proof of my relationship to my dad. I really would advise all these famous people who have children from different relationships to just do the DNA from now and not wait 16 years after death,” Dodd urged.
In May 2004, Sir Coxsone died of an apparent heart attack at the age of 74 at his home in Kingston. He passed away four days after attending a ceremony hosted by the Jamaican Government to rename Brentford Road to Studio One Boulevard, after his famous Studio One production house.
Morna’s brother, Junior, took their stepmother Norma and stepsister Carol to court over their father’s will. He filed the suit in the Supreme Court in 2006, claiming that his name was wrongfully removed from Sir Coxsone’s will, which was made in December 1987. That prevented him from earning royalties from Jamrec, the publishing company of Dodd Sr’s Studio One label. His stepmother and sister said Junior’s name was intentionally removed by Sir Coxsone.
However, in August 2010, the Jamaican Supreme Court ruled in Junior Dodd’s favor. And that, Morna Dodd says, was how her father’s estate ended up in the hands of the Administrator General. Sir Coxsone’s widow, Norma Dodd, passed away in 2010, and his son, Junior Dodd, died in 2015. Sir Coxsone’s mother, who was named one of the executors, predeceased him.
Morna Dodd, who operates her own Sir Coxsone Lounge in England, and has a company called Studio One UK, which she says her father approved of, is in the process of releasing new music. She shared that she has never received any statements, royalties, or anything from her father’s estate. Morna disclosed, however, that she did, in fact, make a deal with an interested party.
LAWYER FEES
“A Chinese guy asked me to sign off, and I did, but the only reason is because I need money to fight Carol in court. I came to Jamaica on one occasion to try and sort out some things, and I had to pay a lawyer £5,000. It has been 16 years, and there is a will, but I have not received a cent in all this time. There has been no statement, whether quarterly or otherwise, about the accounts. It’s COVID time; I don’t want to die and leave it,” she said.
Sir Coxsone’s will states, in part, according to documents filed with the Supreme Court that, “I give, devise and bequeath to my mother aforesaid to my wife Norma and to my children Clement (Junior), Courtney, Paulette, Carol, Morna and Claudia in equal shares all my estate and interest in premises situated at 13 Brentford Road, Kingston 5, together with all my shares in the Jamaica Recording and Publishing Company Limited, with offices at 13 Brentford Road, Kingston 5.”
His legendary Studio One has been hailed as the Motown of Jamaica, and it was there that many artistes got their first real taste of the music working with the soft-spoken producer, who is credited for the early development of ska and reggae. His music catalogue is a veritable treasure trove with songs from greats, including the Wailers, Alton Ellis, Bob Andy, Delroy Wilson, Burning Spear, The Heptones, Marcia Griffiths, Dennis Brown, Sugar Minott and Freddie McGregor.
Morna Dodd recalls a conversation she had with her father shortly after he turned down an offer from Sony to buy his catalogue – an enormous collection that has titles dating back to the late 1950s – preferring instead to license out his music.
“But you had a good offer from Sony,” I said to him, “why didn’t you take it?” He said, ‘It is not about the money. I want this for my children and my children’s children and the black people of Jamaica.’ Father was a no-nonsense person, and I know he is turning in his grave over all that is happening,” Morna Dodd said.
In the 1990s, Sir Coxsone signed a distribution deal with American independent company, Heartbeat Records, which gave the label exclusive rights to release Studio One albums, mainly in the United States and Europe.
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