Before she was wowing crowds the world over with her beautiful voice, before she was dubbed Barbados’ Queen of Song and even before she received a national honor Wendy Alleyne was a little girl with a huge dream.
A dream that one day she would be singing on a big stage before throngs of people screaming her name, “Wendy, Wendy, Wendy”.
Over a decade after this dream, it was almost déjà vu when Alleyne, along with The Dynamics, performed to a roaring crowd at the historic Madison Square Garden in the United States and in the years since, this feeling has been repeated ten times over.
Wendy’s aspiration began as a pre-teen growing up in the tiny rural village of Venture, St John. One of eight children born to Muriel Alleyne, everything this lass did or thought of encompassed singing.
With her trademark honey eyes illuminated as she recalled her childhood, Wendy maintained from the time she could remember singing was all she wanted to do.
“I knew in my heart I would be a singer and that is all I would do. From a child I was in the school choir, church choir . . . My mother would hear me and tell me I straining the notes. I remember Aretha Franklin had a song, A Rose In Spanish Harlem, and you know Aretha sings very high and I couldn’t reach the note no matter how I tried. My mother would laugh when she heard me and say girl you gonna burst yuh heart. One day, she was washing in the yard and I was singing the song and I hit the note and she came in shouting ‘You got, you got it’,” Wendy recounted with a laugh during a recent interview with EASY.
Subsequently, her mother left the island to travel to England. But Wendy’s dream didn’t die.
Every Saturday, through encouragement from the late Dame Olga Lopes-Seale, Alleyne headed to Barbados Rediffusion to participate in the popular Children’s Party. Then one day in 1972, a popular promoter named Eddie Jones, who was listening to the show, heard her vocals and was immediately impressed.
So much so, that he drove to all the way to Venture in search of her. By that time, Wendy was barely 20 years old and lived with her grandmother. But even after several pleas, Jones’ requests to manage the aspiring singer fell on deaf ears for her grandmother who wasn’t interested in giving her permission.
Still Jones was not deterred because he seemingly saw a rare virtuosity in the young woman and wasn’t about to give up so easily. Several months later, he was at it again. This time, Wendy’s mum was back in the island and after a very convincing petition she gave her daughter the go ahead.
“When my mother moved back to Barbados she sent me to classes at that time. It was shorthand and typewriting and I would do it but my heart was not in there. I would always go home and write words to songs and I would always be singing all through the neighbourhood and singing anywhere. She had this big old radiogram and a record player and one thing she did was back me. She used to buy all the latest records and bring them home and me and my younger sister and a niece would get together and do three part harmonies. I would sing and sing and sing; even in my dreams up to this day all I do is sing. So when Eddie came back another time and asked my mother if I could work with him, she told me if this was what I really wanted to do, go ahead,” she said.
Jones arranged for the graduate of the West St Joseph Secondary (now Grantley Adams Memorial) to sing with Smokey Burke and the Twilighters. Her first performance was at the Young Men’s Progressive Club and for her it was like heaven.
“I don’t remember the songs I did but looking back at it I felt really good. It was like yes, I [have] arrived, I’m doing what I want to do. This is it,” she noted with a sense of warmth in her comments.
In addition to working with the Twilighters, Wendy was often teamed with the popular band The Dynamics, which was led by Mike Grosvenor. Their connection was such that Jones matched them permanently and started the group Wendy Alleyne and The Dynamics. This was when the legend that is Wendy Alleyne actually began.
It kicked off when the accomplished songwriter Sach Moore penned her first recording, Let It Show, which he followed up with Spouge chart busters such as Stand By Love and Have A Thing About You. Not to be outdone, Grosvenor added to her repertoire what have since become standards: Can’t Control My Emotions and I’m Depending On You.
Suddenly, she was singing for massive audiences in top venues in and outside of the country. In fact, her voice became a daily staple on the airwaves to the extent that announcers, she wasn’t certain which one, gave her the iconic title of the “Queen of Song”.
Laughing out loudly, Alleyne recalled: “People were going crazy over that but at that time it didn’t hit home with me. I had just liked singing so I sang. People would applaud and go crazy over the music and it (the title) didn’t mean anything to me. I just like getting on stage and signing. Then I toured through the Caribbean and my experience especially in Dominica was extraordinary. We had to drive around the venue three or four times in the van that was carrying the musicians because the people were hitting on the vehicle saying, ‘We want to see Wendy Alleyne, We want to see Wendy Alleyne’ and then they had to bring police to get the gate open before we could get on stage. The best one was in Guyana at the Guyana national park where I was dressing in a dressing room and the people were ripping off the sides to get in there.”
As a female in what seemed to be a man’s world during that era, adjusting to life as one of the Caribbean’s hottest acts and bearing the title of “Queen of Song” wasn’t too difficult to do. According to Wendy, she had role models like Fern Trail, Norma Stoute, Cynthia Layne then later Carlyn Leacock and Sheryl Hackett who were integrals supporters and confidants.
What these women advised her, and what has served to be the key to her success and longevity, was that authenticity was essential.
“Whenever you get a gig to do or perform, do your best. Do not imitate nobody, just be yourself. Don’t try to be like the next singer, the Beyoncés, the Mary J Bliges, be [yourselves] and you can never go wrong. Nobody can say she attempted to hit the note like so and so and she failed. Be your self and always listen. When older singers and musicians tell you stuff it is things that they went through—if they have something to tell you, pay attention. That is what I did and even to today, continue to do. I am me. It doesn’t matter even if I do covers. . . I never strive to be like nobody. I put me in everything,” Wendy declared.
On whether she is pleased about the level of prosperity she has had over more than four decades in the entertainment business, certainly Wendy was.
Smiling, Wendy quipped that she may not be making millions like international superstar and hometown sweetheart, Rihanna, but she is quite happy with her accomplishments.
“I am happy because I know that when I go out there I do my best. Am I satisfied? I don’t know but I am happy. Happy to be able to be doing it now at this time. Happy to be able to do what I love,” Alleyne said with a broad smile.
Nowadays, the celebrated songstress is actively in demand and singing her heart out. Many will argue this time she’s sweeter.
Wendy has three sons, all of whom have followed in her footsteps: twins Peterson and Paul are singer/producer and songwriter, respectively. While her youngest son Adrian is a reggae artist. And She is a grandmother to two boys. (SDB Media)
