Seven Jamaicans based in Canada and the United States will contest the semi-finals of the Jamaica International Independence Foreign Song Competition (JIIFSC). The contestants were announced on May 17 by Dr Garfield McCook, the event\u2019s founder.<\/p>\n
They include Georgia-based Ernel Earlington, who won last year with \u2018Jamaica Nice\u2019<\/em><\/strong>, performed with his group Doxology. Their entry this year is \u2018If Yuh Love Jamaica seh Yes\u2019<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n His rivals are Chawlih Crux out of Washington DC with \u2018Jamaica Now<\/em>;\u2019<\/strong> Lisa Blackford, who represents Virginia with \u2018My Jamaica Home Sweet Home\u2019;<\/em><\/strong> Boston-based Dion Knibb with \u2018My Sweet Jamaica\u2019;<\/em><\/strong> IJAHKNOWAH from Georgia, who does \u2018Yardie\u2019;<\/em><\/strong> Lee \u201cPriest\u201d Johnson out of Georgia with \u2018Jamaica ina mi Blood\u2019;<\/em><\/strong> and Canada-based Tania Lou whose entry is \u2018Jamaica Soul\u2019<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n The finalists will be announced on July 1, with the final scheduled for July 25 in Snellville, Georgia. This year\u2019s winner receives US$8,000 plus a trophy; second place, $5,000 plus trophy and third place $1000.<\/p>\n Toronto-based singer Lavie Lujah won the inaugural contest in 2021 with \u2018Certified Yardie\u2019<\/em><\/strong>. \u2018IRIE\u2019<\/em><\/strong> by GoddySon out of New York won in 2022, while Ohio-based Leon \u201cLetonick\u201d Denton took the honours in 2023 with \u2018Jamaican in Mi\u2019<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n Inspired by the popular Festival Song Competition in Jamaica, McCook launched the JIIFSC four years ago. It is open to artists in Jamaica\u2019s Diaspora.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Seven Jamaicans based in Canada and the United States will contest the semi-finals of the Jamaica International Independence Foreign Song Competition (JIIFSC). The contestants were announced on May 17 by Dr Garfield McCook, the event\u2019s founder. They include Georgia-based Ernel Earlington, who won last year with \u2018Jamaica Nice\u2019, performed with his group Doxology. Their entry […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":10761,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[239],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10767"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10767\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10768,"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10767\/revisions\/10768"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10761"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandbox.reggaenorthca.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}