Jimmy Cliff, Jamaican reggae star and actor, dead at 81
Source: ABC News
November 24, 2025, 7:35 AM
Jimmy Cliff, a Grammy award-winning Jamaican reggae star and actor, is dead at 81, according to his family.
"It’s with profound sadness that I share that my husband, Jimmy Cliff, has crossed over due to a seizure followed by pneumonia," Latifa Chambers, Cliff's wife, said in a post on his official Instagram account. Cliff's award-winning career as a musician spanned decades and included some of reggae's most memorable hits, including "Many Rivers to Cross."
That and two other hits -- "You Can Get It If You Really Want" and "The Harder They Come" -- were standouts on the official soundtrack for a 1972 film, also titled "The Harder They Come," that featured Cliff as its star. He played a young reggae star who's drawn into what's portrayed as the often-seedy world of music production in Jamaica.
"Cliff’s portrayal is riveting and authentic," the Grammy Awards wrote in an appraisal of the soundtrack marking 50 years after the movie's release. It noted that Cliff, who was born James Chambers, had seen at least some of what was portrayed in the film. "While pursuing a career as a singer, Cliff saw firsthand the crime, violence and the survival of the fittest mindset within the ghetto areas where reggae was birthed."
Read more: https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/jimmy-cliff-jamaican-reggae-star-actor-dead-81/story?id=127817843
Article updated.
Original article -
Jimmy Cliff, a Grammy award-winning Jamaican reggae star and actor, is dead at 81, according to his family.
"It’s with profound sadness that I share that my husband, Jimmy Cliff, has crossed over due to a seizure followed by pneumonia," Latifa Chambers, Cliff's wife, said in a post on his official Instagram account.
Cliff's award-winning career as a musician spanned decades and included some of reggae's most memorable hits, including "Many Rivers to Cross."
Two other hits -- "You Can Get It If You Really Want" and "The Harder They Come" -- were standouts on the official soundtrack for a 1972 film, also titled "The Harder They Come," that featured Cliff as its star.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
= new reply since forum marked as read
Thank you for all your music.
By the rivers of Babylon
Where we sat down
And there we wept
When we remembered Zion
But the wicked carried us away in captivity
Required from us a song
How can we sing King Alpha song
In a strange land?
'Cause the wicked carried us away in captivity
Required from us a song
How can we sing King Alpha song
In a strange land?
Sing it out loud!
Sing a song of freedom sister!
Sing a song of freedom brother!
We gotta sing and shout it!
We gotta jump and shout it!
Shout the song of freedom now
So let the words of our mouth
And the meditation of our heart
Be acceptable in Thy sight, oh Far I
So let the words of our mouth
And the meditation of our heart
Be acceptable in Thy sight, oh Far I
Sing it again!
We've got to sing it together!
We've got to shout it together!
By the rivers of Babylon
Where we sat down
And there we wept
When we remembered Zion