R&B singer Wesley Jamison on finding an audience in Hong Kong, and racial fetishisation
- Wesley Jamison, who moved to Hong Kong 10 years ago, talks about the city’s hip hop and R&B scenes, and being fetishised as a black person
Wesley Jamison grew up in a musical household in the Paris suburbs and has always loved to sing, but because of his introverted nature and his parents’ experiences in the music industry, he did not seriously consider pursuing it as a career until he moved halfway across the world to Hong Kong.
That was 10 years ago. Since then, he has come out of his shell, become a songwriter and helped promote the local hip hop and R&B scenes.
“I repressed it a lot, I think. I had to leave […] to start feeling like maybe I can do something [with music],” he says. “My mum is a singer and I used to follow her to the studio and shows, but she was strict and never wanted me to sing because it’s a tough job.”
His father’s diverse musical tastes helped him discover different genres when he was growing up, he adds.
His one true love, however, is R&B. “It began when I was young, just hearing 1990s and early 2000s R&B at home. The culture of where I’m from exposed me to a lot of hip hop, to which R&B is tied.