Pier Tosi has been spinning Reggae in Italy for the past 33 years. He has hosted most Reggae and Dub artists who have played or performed in Bologna, and has supported Rototom Reggae Sunsplash since their first staging. He has researched Reggae, collected vinyl and promoted the culture from the day he first heard riddim.
VP: When did you first fall in love with Reggae?
PT: Since I was a teenager in the late 70s but it’s something very instinctive that I can’t really explain rationally. Here in Italy on the radio, there was mainly Bob Marley and Peter Tosh music playing and the beat fascinated from the first time I heard it.
The music was so powerful and exotic and very different from all the other music that was being played on the radio – it literally caught me. I collected every article on the Italian newspaper stands about reggae music. In my town of Bologna, Peter Tosh played an epic show in July 1979 with Sly & Robbie’s Word Sound & Power but I missed it because I was just 14 and I was living in a small village in the town area. For the same reason I missed the two shows Bob Marley did in Italy in June 1980. The Milano one was a legendary show!
I started to buy reggae albums and cassettes (the reggae records distributed worldwide by Island and Virgin) when I was 13 or 14 and then I started following other kinds of music and went to a lot of rock shows. The Clash became my favourite rock band and they were connected with reggae too! Fast Forward to 25, and I had the opportunity to start to do a radio show on an alternative station in my area. A couple of years later, I decided to do a reggae show because there were no reggae shows around. My vinyl collection and knowledge about the music and culture was very deep because of all of my research.
I was totally in love with the genre!
VP: You are very passionate about Roots Reggae and Dub – what is it that attracts you so much?
PT: As I told you before, Bob Marley and Peter Tosh caught me! Reggae became very popular in those days because of the social, mystical and political issues that artists talked about in their music. At the same time millions of people all over the world were caught by this music that was about freedom, peace, justice and human rights – even if you did not fully understand the lyrics and you weren’t at all into Rasta, you were feeling the mystical power and the urgency of the music. Looking at the pictures of the artists it was clear and evident they were real rebels. A very important thing is that roots music is talking about suffering and being angry about the injustices … a lot of people all over the world in very different circumstances are feeling the same suffering and anger and that’s why they can identify themself with the power of this music. Dub is something very exclusive from Jamaican music that did influence all the dance music worldwide. There is something very fascinating yet there’s something very ancient and, at the same time, very futuristic about dub. In dub landscapes it’s like the very ancient African drums are travelling the space on a spaceship … roots reggae is about a judgement day that will come and the dread of dub will be the soundtrack of it for real!

VP: You have been on-air for 25 years now! Can you share 2 highlights / great moments that you cherish?
PT: I did start the reggae show named Soul Shakedown Party in 1992 and it’s now on air since then on the same station that in the meantime changed their name, so technically it’s 33 years of reggae history on Soul Shakedown Party!
Highlights include interviewing Italian reggae bands and artists who have become great friends of mine. I had a lot of interviews of Jamaican artists too. In 1994 the Rototom Sunsplash Reggae Festival started in Italy which was a two-day event. Later they moved to Spain. Now they are one of the most celebrated reggae festivals in the world. I participated in the festival for the very first time in 1998 and soon after, I did audio and video streaming. I was chosen to host because of my passion and knowledge for reggae music.
Every year I had the privilege to meet and interview all the greatest reggae artists of the past and present right after their shows on this live and direct audio and video streaming. Another highlight coming to my mind is a few years ago we had Keith & Tex and Rudy Mills do a show in Bologna. They had a few days off in town and came as guests on my show with the musicians and we had an acoustic showcase live and direct with them singing classics like ‘Tonight’ or ‘Stop That Train’ for my audience and we had a very deep reasoning about their career.
VP: You are one of the few DJs to have a radio show in Italy and in Jamaica. How did you accomplish that?
PT: Once again this came thanks to the Rototom Sunsplash Festival. I’m part of the Reggae University crew alongside my great friends David Katz and Riddim’s Magazine Ellen Koehlings and Pete Lily. Every year we host some workshops about topics related to reggae music involving the artists performing at the festival and some other personalities and through this we gave the audience a chance to ask questions to their favourite artists. At the festival I met Dr. Dennis Howard from Jamaica, a man who had a very important role in the development of reggae music and we talked a lot about the love for the music and about how reggae has become a global phenomenon. A few years later he asked me to do a one-hour weekly radio show on Hitz 92 FM in Jamaica. Dennis asked me to not imitate Jamaican radio deejays, but to be totally myself and to play some global reggae from Italy, Europe, USA, South America or wherever and to demonstrate how reggae is big on global basis. In this show I play a lot of Jamaican music from the past, the present and hopefully the future. I had my first show in Jamaica in February 2019 and I’m regularly on air each and every thursday at 9.30 pm on Hitz 92 FM for one hour and the show is also available as a podcast on the Podomatic platform. You can find me by Googling Pier Tosi and Podomatic.
VP: What are you most looking forward to for 2025?
PT: In the new year I hope to see new good music coming from Jamaica. If you compare the releases from Jamaica we have now with the ones we had for example 20 years ago you can see there’s a lot less music coming out of the island – there is a kind of crisis going on in that sense. There is a crisis in the music business all over the globe because of the economic crisis that is hitting everyone everywhere. The people are struggling with the cost of living getting higher. Luckily there is a lot of collaboration between European and American musicians and producers and young and old Jamaican artists and the fruits of it are great records being released. In 2025 The Rototom Sunsplash will celebrate its 30th anniversary and I’m sure it will be an edition to remember.
VP: Outside of Reggae, what other genres of music do you listen to?
PT: I like to listen to jazz, soul, old rhythm & blues, funk and disco. American black music has always been a very important source of inspiration for Jamaican music and to be familiar with the black music coming from the USA in all genres is important to better understand Jamaican music. Since the birth of the original ska that was very inspired by jazz, we had hundreds of incredible ska, rocksteady and reggae covers of R&B, funk or soul tunes. It is totally great to discover the connections between Reggae and American black music.
VP: Where can fans find you on social media?
PT: I am on Facebook and Instagram as Pier Tosi and on Facebook the reggae show is Soul Shakedown Party.
The Italian radio show is on air every Tuesday night 9pm-11pm european time on Radio Città Fujiko and the Jamaican show is on air every Thursday night 9.30pm -10.30pm EST on Hitz 92 FM.
Tune in to Soul Shakedown Party
https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/piertosi