How Brushy got his one string
Brushy one-string was a hit at this year’s WOMAD festival. Farah Hancock was there.
Brushy the one-man, one-guitar-string act drew standing room only crowds at WOMAD. Photo: supplied.
One night Brushy said he had a vision, where a white-bearded dwarf gave him a guitar with one string and told him to play it.
In his vision, Brushy said when he started to play he was surrounded by animals in suits praising his music. The dwarf presented him with a straw hat and cowboy boots.
Clad in a cowboy hat and boots Brushy One String performed at this year’s WOMAD music festival using just his voice and one-stringed guitar to produce a soulful blues and reggae set, regularly punctuated by throaty laughs.
Brushy shot to fame after appearing in the Rise Up documentary which explored Jamaica’s underground music scene. He now tours the word and has millions of views on his YouTube videos.
Brushy’s musical heritage is impressive. His father was reggae great Freddie Mckay and his mother, Beverly Foster, was a backing singer for Tina Turner.
Both parents died when he was young and Brushy was raised by his grandmother.
Music was always a love but skill took time to develop.
Brushy’s grandmother told him if he wanted to grow up to be an entertainer he needed to practice.
“So, I was practicing my music and she came out and wopped me over the back, saying I’m making so much noise. I said to her, you say I must practice music and you beat me for my music!
“She said, I didn’t beat you for music, I beat you for the damn noise you’re making in my head!”
Brushy played his guitar so hard making ‘damn noise’ he broke all but the E string.
In the morning Brushy told his uncle about his vision of finding fame with a one-stringed guitar.
Brushy said his uncle asked him: “How many guitar strings does a guitar have?”
“And I was like, six, twelve, four. And he said damn right. You realise you are a fool now right?”
Brushy dug his one-stringed guitar out from under his bed and practiced all day, eventually he managed to copy a pop song.
The next day he went to his grandmother’s house.
“I take away her maxi frock. I take away her big straw hat, one of her spectacle glasses, the lens thick like my finger and one of her spikey shoes looking like cowboy boots.
“I ran to the next town and I went under the clock and I started to sing.
“A whole lot of people gathered around me but they were all saying – there’s a new madman in town, but this madman can play a guitar and it’s a ONE string guitar. We better give him something.
“I made a lot of money that day.”
With the money he made busking in his grandmother’s clothes he bought a Walkman stereo so he could tape songs from the radio and practice.
“And here I am today,” he said.
