Jimmy Cliff, reggae music legend, dead at 81

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File: Jamaican singer Jimmy Cliff performs on stage in London, England; August 19, 1970. (Photo by TPLP/Getty Images)

Jimmy Cliff, the trailblazing Jamaican singer who helped popularize reggae, ska and rocksteady music over a 60-year career, has died. He was 81 years old.

His family posted a message Monday on his social media sites that he died from a "seizure followed by pneumonia." 

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Cliff was known for hits like Many Rivers to Cross," "You Can Get it If You Really Want" and "Vietnam" and also starred in the film "The Harder They Come," the Associated Press reported. 

Reuters reported that Cliff won a Grammy Award for best reggae album for "Rebirth" in 2012 and another Grammy in 1984 for "Cliff Hanger."

Cliff would go on to record over 30 albums and perform all over the world. 

Who was Jimmy Cliff?

The backstory:

Jimmy Cliff was a native Jamaican who joined Kingston’s rising music scene in his teens and helped lead a movement in the 1960s that included such future stars as Bob Marley, Toots Hibbert and Peter Tosh. 

The musician's career peaked with "The Harder They Come," but, after a break in the late 1970s, the Associated Press noted that Cliff worked steadily for decades, whether session work with the Rolling Stones or collaborations with Wyclef Jean, Sting and Annie Lennox and others. 

Cliff was nominated for seven Grammys and won twice for best reggae album: in 1986 for "Cliff Hanger" and in 2012 for the well-named "Rebirth." Cliff's other albums included the Grammy-nominated "The Power and the Glory," "Humanitarian" and the 2022 release "Refugees."