Hedley Jones

Hedley H. G. Jones OD (12 November 1917 – 1 September 2017) was a Jamaican musician, audio engineer, inventor, trade unionist and writer. He designed and played one of the first solid-bodied electric guitars, designed and built Jamaica's first sound systems and traffic lights, and in 2011 was awarded the Musgrave Gold Medal for distinguished eminence in the field of music.

Biography He was born near Linstead, Jamaica, the son of David and Hettie Jones, In 1935 he moved to Kingston, where he heard Marcus Garvey speak, and worked as a tailor, cabinet maker, bus conductor, repairing sewing machines, radios and gramophones. Inspired by the recordings of Charlie Christian, but unable to afford an imported guitar, he built himself a solid-bodied electric guitar and was featured with it on the front page of The Gleaner in September 1940, at about the same time that Les Paul was doing similar pioneering work in the US. Jones continued to build guitars for other Jamaican musicians in the years that followed.

In 1943 he joined the British Royal Air Force, trained as a radar engineer at the Royal Technical College in Glasgow, "The public address system prior to World War II was designed to electronically respond to a limited range of audio frequencies, covering voice and general purposes. As against such limitation, a Jamaican sound system was designed to respond with low surface noise, low distortion, and high fidelity, over the complete audio range of frequencies from 15 Hz to 20 kHz: a huge technological difference. The Jones model High-Fidelity audio amplifier of 1947 was designed to perform the function of reproduction of the full audio spectrum; and that was the model Tom Wong acquired and named a Sound System. Before that era noisy PA systems were the norm."

He then helped build an early sound system for hardware store owner and DJ Tom Wong, known as Tom the Great Sebastian. After Wong's success in establishing the popularity of dance parties, Jones built sound systems for rival DJs, including Arthur "Duke" Reid, whose Trojan sound system became the most popular, and Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd. In 1963, Dodd commissioned Jones to build the equipment for his Studio One recording studios in Kingston.

With his cousin Stephen, Jones also built and demonstrated Jamaica's first traffic lights in 1952, following the devastation caused by Hurricane Charlie. Between 1959 and 1964 he was an instructor at Kingston Technical High School.

He married Norma in 1943; they had six sons and three daughters. He died in Montego Bay on 1 September 2017, at age 99.