Reggae is a music genre first developed in Jamaica in the late 1960s. While sometimes used in a broader sense to refer to most types of Jamaican music, the term reggae more properly denotes a particular music style that originated following on the development of ska and rocksteady.

Although reggae was strongly influenced by traditional African, American jazz and old-time rhythm and blues, reggae owes its direct origins to the progressive development of ska and rocksteady in 1960s Jamaica. 

An important factor in this development was the influence of Rastafari, with Rasta drummers like Count Ossie contributing to seminal recordings, bringing the influence of these rhythmic patterns into the music.

Reggae as a musical term first appeared in print with the 1968 rocksteady hit “Do the Reggay” by The Maytals, but there are many different theories as to how the term originated. The music itself was faster than rocksteady, but tighter and more complex than ska, with obvious debts to both styles, while going beyond them both.

Speaking to the terms origins, reggae artist Derrick Morgan stated:
We didn’t like the name rock steady, so I tried a different version of ‘Fat Man’. It changed the beat again, it used the organ to creep. Bunny Lee, the producer, liked that. He created the sound with the organ and the rhythm guitar. 

It sounded like ‘reggae, reggae’ and that name just took off. Bunny Lee started using the world [sic, recte word] and soon all the musicians were saying ‘reggae, reggae, reggae’.