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Dernel Green: the composer engineer behind the Signal Band sound

Published October 20, 2026

Dernel Green, credited most often as Dernel “Dernz” Green, is one of the most constant shadow names of current Dominican bouyon: composer, producer, engineer, arranger and backing singer, almost always in the orbit of Signal Band and its singer Shelly. Between 2018 and 2026, seventeen verified recordings carry his name in their credits, from the first Signal Band records, “Ani Ba Yo Love” and “Youngest & Baddest”, to the hit “Bye to de Old Me”, Music Video of the Year at the Dominica Music Awards, by way of two productions under his own credit outside the band: “Black Girl Magic” by Starsha, which he produces, and “Congratulations” by Trilla-G, which he co-produces with Fr3EzE. No biography of him is published in the opened sources: this profile is therefore a credits file, followed record by record, which also says, frankly, what the listings do not say.

Who Dernel Green is: a credits file, not a biography

Start with the limit, because it governs this whole profile. None of the sources opened for this research publishes a biography of Dernel Green: no birth date or place, no background, no interview, no verified artist page, no confirmed official account. What the sources publish, by contrast, is abundant and precise: credits, record by record, across eight years of releases, with roles that repeat often enough to draw a trade. This profile publishes those credits, in their order, and lends Dernel Green no life that the listings do not tell.

The roles first. On the Signal Band records of the late 2010s, he is the composer: “Ani Ba Yo Love” in 2018, “Youngest & Baddest” the same year, “Land of d Bouyon” in 2019. On the records of the early 2020s, he moves to the broader writing credit of the listings, a credited songwriter on “Coming Down”, “Doh See Me”, “Money Money (Live)” and “Carnival Is Woman”. On the 2025 and 2026 wave, he is above all the engineer and the producer: producer of “Bye to de Old Me” with Andel Horsford and of “Black Girl Magic”, engineer on “RAGS” and “Not A Word”, additional production and engineering on “Body Language”, “Calendar Riddim 2025” and “Lè i Bon”, and mixing and mastering, under the name DernzMusik, on “Kyoné Me” by Trilla-G. Few names on this scene cover the whole chain in this way, from composition to the final sound.

The name itself comes in three published forms, and this profile keeps them distinct as the sources give them. The full form, Dernel Green, is that of the platform listings. The nickname form, Dernel “Dernz” Green, is that of the official descriptions of the Signal Band and Shelly videos. And the banner form, DernzMusik, appears in the mixing credits of Trilla-G and in the producer list of his album, while a First Serenade Band description writes DernzMuzsik for the place where its vocals were recorded, a spelling published as it stands by that source. Behind those three forms, the credits point to the same studio man, attached to Dominica by the scene that employs him, Signal Band, Shelly, Trilla-G and Starsha being Dominican names documented on this site, without any source publishing his own origin.

His historical anchoring helps to place the trade. The sung carnival bouyon he serves, that of Signal Band, descends from bouyon soca, started by Dada in 2003 in Dominica according to the first hand testimony of Sean “Smokiller” Francis, Dominican-born, who was in the rooms where it began, and popularized by Triple Kay. Twenty years later, the style lives on studio producers and engineers as much as on stage bands, and Dernel Green is one of the documented craftsmen of that second era: the one where the record leaves a programmed riddim, passes through a named engineer, and ends on a national award list.

2018 to 2021: the composer of the first Signal Band

The first verified trace of the name is a double role. “Ani Ba Yo Love”, by Signal Band featuring Shelly, was released on April 6, 2018 on the Signal Band label, at 120 BPM, the slowest tempo of this whole file. Its listing credits Dernel Green as composer and as producer, alongside Sheldon Alfred, writer of the lyrics and co-producer. From the very first record, the geometry that will last eight years is in place: Sheldon Alfred, the Signal Band singer known as Shelly, writes and sings, Dernel Green composes and produces, and the band signs the release under its own name.

The same year, on July 20, 2018, “Youngest & Baddest”, again by Signal Band featuring Shelly, appeared on the album “Signature”, at 157 BPM. Its listing credits Dernel Green as composer, Sheldon Alfred on lyrics and composition, and Signal Band on production. On February 8, 2019, “Land of d Bouyon”, whose title carries the name of the genre itself, repeats the same split: Dernel Green composer, Sheldon Alfred lyrics and composition, Signal Band producer. Three records, three times the same composition signature: in the first years of the band, the music of Signal Band, in the sense of the published credits, is in large part his.

The early 2020s move his credit from composition to shared writing. “Coming Down”, by Signal Band featuring Wawa, was released on January 16, 2020 on Signal Band Inc., and its listing lines up three songwriters: Anwar Cadette, Dernel Green and Sheldon Miguel Alfred, the full form of Shelly name. “Doh See Me”, released on November 24, 2021 on the album “Controversy”, again on Signal Band Inc. and at 157 BPM, with about 1,000 identifications counted, credits a single songwriter in its listing: Dernel Green. It is the loneliest writing credit of his file, and it falls on a record of the album of a band then in full construction of its audience.

Taken together, this first period makes Dernel Green the reference composer of the documented beginnings of Signal Band, before the band became the awards machine of 2026. The records are singles and album pieces of the Dominican scene, published under the banners of the band, and their counters stay modest at the opening of the listings. But the continuity of the name, from 2018 to 2021, on the roles that found a sound, composition then writing, is the first salient fact of this file: Signal Band did not have to look for its composer, it had him from its 2018 listings on.

2023 to 2025: the engineer of the Signal Band and Trilla-G wave

The thread resumes, in the opened listings, on March 6, 2023 with “Money Money (Live)”, by Signal Band on Signal Band Inc., at 160 BPM. Dernel Green is there one of the four credited songwriters, with Sheldon Alfred, Arade Moses, the programmer known as Maskman, and Marsha Laurent, the legal name of Starsha. That crossed credit matters: the writer of “Black Girl Magic” writes here with the man who will produce her record, inside the same Signal Band workshop, two years before their collaboration under his own credit appears in the credits of an official video.

The year 2024 sees him step outside the sole perimeter of the band. On December 6, 2024, “Carnival Is Woman”, by Th3rd featuring Trilla-G, was released on Th3rdHouse, at 160 BPM, with about 1,400 identifications counted. Its listing credits eight songwriters, among them Dernel Green, alongside in particular Gael Jno Baptiste, the legal name of Trilla-G, and Anthony Nibbs, of the Th3rdHouse workshop of the US Virgin Islands. The name of Dernel Green therefore circulates, from 2024, in the Trilla-G and Th3rd network, the second pole of his file after Signal Band.

The year 2025 is his densest year of verified credits. On January 27, 2025, “Bye to de Old Me”, by Signal Band featuring Shelly, was released on Signal Band Inc., at 160 BPM, with about 13,200 identifications counted, the highest counter of this file: Dernel Green is a producer there, with Andel Horsford, the full name of Fr3EzE, and he also sings in the backing vocals. On April 9, 2025, “RAGS”, by Trilla-G featuring Skinny Fabulous and Shelly, on Still Trill Ent., at 155 BPM and about 6,800 identifications, credits him as engineer, with A Plus on production and Starsha on backing vocals. And on April 21, 2025, “Not A Word”, by Signal Band featuring Trilla-G, on the EP “Signal Dat Dere Wii”, credits him again as engineer. In four months, the same name therefore holds the sound of the two headliners of the wave, the band and the singer.

Around those three listings, the official descriptions of the videos of the same period add the workshop roles that the platforms summarise badly. On “Body Language”, by Shelly and Signal Band, composed by Dylan “ProducerDlo” Lowe, he handles the additional production and engineering with the band. On “Calendar Riddim 2025”, by Shelly and Signal Band, written by Sheldon Alfred and Liam Sebastien on a riddim programmed by Maskman, he handles the additional arrangement and engineering. The vocabulary is constant from one description to the next: additional, arrangement, engineering. It is the vocabulary of the man the workshop calls to finish the records, and both descriptions also credit him, each time, in the backing vocals.

“Bye to de Old Me” and “Black Girl Magic”: the producer under his own credit

The record that crowns this path is “Bye to de Old Me”. The production notes published by Sokah2Soca, carried by Island Vybe in November 2025, give its fullest card: performed by Shelly, Nice and Pudaz, written by Sheldon Alfred, Miguel Hussey and Udi Prince, composed and engineering by Dernel “Dernz” Green, additional riddim programming by Fr3EzE, live bass by Giovannie “Gio” Green, and backing vocals by Darren Green, Dernel Green, Giovannie Green and Liam Sebastien. The platform listing of the same record, under the name of Signal Band featuring Shelly, gives him as producer with Andel Horsford. The two sources complete each other without contradicting each other: it is his most complete record, composition, engineering, production and backing vocals together.

The crowning of the record is institutional, and this profile gives it with its exact source. According to the report by Black Island Girl Multimedia, published on January 5, 2026, Signal Band won six awards at the Dominica Music Awards, at the ceremony of Saturday January 3, 2026 at the InterContinental Resort and Spa: Band of the Year, Album of the Year for “Electric Room”, and Music Video of the Year for “Bye to de Old Me”, while Shelly won Songwriter of the Year and Male Artist of the Year there. The Producer of the Year of that edition, by contrast, is Mr Ridge, and not Dernel Green: this profile writes it plainly, so as not to turn the victory of the band into a personal trophy that the winners list does not give him. His most decorated record is therefore decorated through the band and its video, which is already, for an engineer, the most public form of recognition this scene hands out.

The second producer record under his own credit leaves the band. “Black Girl Magic”, by Starsha, whose official video, opened for this research, gives the full credits, is produced by Dernel Green, written by Marsha Laurent with additional writing credits for Aswad “Zwady” Polydore, and carries the vocal engineering, mixing and mastering of Cornell Phillip. No release date is published in the description of the video, and this profile therefore invents none. The fact, for its part, is clear: the singer from Layou, documented on this site for her soca and bouyon path since 2017, entrusts the production of her manifesto record to Dernel Green, who works here with the other reference engineer of the island, Cornell Phillip, each at one end of the chain, the production on one side, the voice and the final sound on the other.

The geometry of those two records draws his real status. With Signal Band, he is the sound man of a collective that wins everything in 2026. With Starsha, he is the sole named producer of a solo artist record. In both cases, he is never the headline voice: his name appears in the credits, not in the title lines, and that is precisely what makes this file worth building, documenting the work without which the title lines would not exist in their published form.

DernzMusik, the Green trio of the credits, and “Congratulations”

The banner name DernzMusik marks the next step: the one where the engineer becomes an address. The Bajan Reporter, in its report of the release of “Take Me As I Am: The Album”, the first album of Trilla-G released on October 22, 2025 and recorded at Th3rdHouse Studios in the US Virgin Islands, places DernzMusik among the Dominican production credits of the record, alongside Mask Man and Fr3EzE. And the official description of “Kyoné Me”, a record of that album produced by prodbyMax and written by Gael Jno Baptiste and Tridel Edwin, credits the mixing and mastering to Dernel Green, in the form Dernel Green (DernzMusik). The best documented album of Trilla-G therefore passes, for at least one record, through his hands at the moment of the final sound.

A third address confirms the studio status. The official description of “Take Yuh Foot”, by First Serenade Band, released under a 2026 copyright, produced by Logically Don Productions and Maskman on a riddim by Arade “Maskman” Moses, states that the vocals were recorded at Dernel Green, in a place the source writes DernzMuzsik, a spelling this profile reproduces as published without correcting it or merging it with DernzMusik. A band of the tradition of the bands of Dominica therefore comes to record its vocals at his place: the engineer of the platform singles is also a recording place for the live scene of the island.

A credit pattern runs through the whole file and asks to be published with caution. On “Body Language”, “Calendar Riddim 2025”, “Lè i Bon” and “Bye to de Old Me”, the backing vocals line up three names of the same published surname: Darren Green, Dernel Green and Giovannie Green, the last one also holding the bass, the synth bass or the live guitar according to the records, and Darren signing the artwork of several releases. No source consulted states the link between those three names, and this profile claims none: it records a recurring trio of credits, a bassist, an artwork designer and backing singer, and an engineer and backing singer, which forms, with Maskman on programming and Akim “Haze” Hazel on live drums, the stable sound workshop of Signal Band. Reading that pattern as a family affair would be plausible, but undocumented, and this site publishes only the documented.

The most recent record of the file closes this path in February 2026. CaribMagPlus, on February 10, 2026, announces “Congratulations”, the single of Trilla-G written during his illness and released after the announcement of his remission: the record, with Th3rd as a guest, is produced by Andel “Fr3EzE” Horsford and Dernel Green, with additional writing by Shane Maloone and Christon Jno Baptiste and the live guitar of Giovannie Green. The producer of the manifesto record of Starsha therefore becomes, in the same season, the co-producer of the resilience record of Trilla-G: the two major voices of his file outside the band join him on records of personal stake, which says the trust the scene places in his sound.

The Dernz method, and the limits of the public record

Taken together, the seventeen verified credits of this file draw a method readable in three times. First compose for a band that is starting out, between 2018 and 2021, with Sheldon Alfred as a constant writing partner. Then hold the engineering of that same band turned headliner, and of its wave neighbours, Trilla-G and Th3rd, between 2023 and 2025, on records at 155 and 160 BPM whose counters pass those of his beginnings. Finally produce under his own credit, for Starsha and in co-production for Trilla-G, and lend his banner name, DernzMusik, to the mixing of an album and to the vocal recording of a band. It is the complete path of a studio man of the second era of bouyon, and it is entirely readable in the credits, without any interview having come to tell it.

The scene context completes the portrait. Around him, the same names return as around every craftsman of this wave: Maskman, Arade Moses, on riddim programming, Fr3EzE, Andel Horsford, on production and additional programming, ProducerDlo, Dylan Lowe, on composition, prod.bysavion in the same Dominican studio ecosystem, and Cornell Phillip, with whom he shares the chain of “Black Girl Magic”. Dernel Green is not an isolated producer: he is a node of the current Dominican workshop, the one documented by the Signal Band, Shelly and Trilla-G pages of this site, and this profile gives that node its own page because the credits justify it record by record.

The limits of the file are as clear as its facts, and this profile states them to finish. No biography, no birth date, no published origin, no interview and no verified official account of Dernel Green were found during this research: the sameAs field of this page therefore stays empty. No release as a lead artist is credited to him in the opened sources: his catalog is a catalog of credits on the records of others. The description of “Black Girl Magic” publishes no release date, and the counters quoted in this profile are those counted at the opening of the listings, which will keep moving. The winners list of the Dominica Music Awards 2025, finally, crowns his band and his video, but its Producer of the Year title goes to Mr Ridge, and this profile refuses to attribute it to him by contagion.

To hear the work of Dernel Green, start with “Bye to de Old Me” for the complete record, composition, production, engineering and backing vocals, then “Black Girl Magic” by Starsha for the production under his own credit, “Ani Ba Yo Love” and “Land of d Bouyon” for the composer of the beginnings, “RAGS” and “Kyoné Me” for the engineer and mixer of the Trilla-G wave, and “Lè i Bon”, with Shelly and Krys, for his most recent workshop work. The full repertoire is followed in our bouyon playlist and on our bouyon producers page. If a biography or an official account one day appears, this profile will be completed and dated, like every page on this site.

Frequently asked questions

Who is Dernel Green?

Dernel Green, also credited as Dernel “Dernz” Green and, for his banner, DernzMusik, is a composer, producer and sound engineer of Dominican bouyon, documented by the credits of seventeen verified recordings between 2018 and 2026, almost always around Signal Band and Shelly. No biography of him is published in the sources consulted: no birth, no origin, no interview. This profile publishes his credits, record by record, and states that limit from the start.

Which records did Dernel Green compose for Signal Band?

The opened listings credit him as composer on “Ani Ba Yo Love”, released on April 6, 2018, where he is also a producer with Sheldon Alfred, on “Youngest & Baddest”, released on July 20, 2018 on the album Signature, and on “Land of d Bouyon”, released on February 8, 2019. He is then a credited songwriter on “Coming Down” in 2020, “Doh See Me” in 2021, where his listing names him as the only songwriter, “Money Money (Live)” in 2023 and “Carnival Is Woman” by Th3rd featuring Trilla-G in 2024.

Did Dernel Green produce “Bye to de Old Me”?

Yes, according to two opened sources that complete each other. The listing of the record, by Signal Band featuring Shelly, released on January 27, 2025 on Signal Band Inc., credits him as producer with Andel Horsford and in the backing vocals. The production notes published by Sokah2Soca credit him with the composition and the engineering, with Shelly, Nice and Pudaz as performers. The record won Music Video of the Year at the Dominica Music Awards, at the ceremony of January 3, 2026, on a night when Signal Band won six awards. The Producer of the Year of that edition is Mr Ridge, and not Dernel Green.

What is DernzMusik?

The banner name under which Dernel Green signs part of his studio work. The official description of “Kyoné Me”, by Trilla-G, credits the mixing and mastering to Dernel Green (DernzMusik), and The Bajan Reporter places DernzMusik among the Dominican production credits of the album Take Me As I Am by Trilla-G, released on October 22, 2025. A First Serenade Band description also writes DernzMuzsik for the place where its vocals were recorded for “Take Yuh Foot”, a spelling published as it stands by that source.

What is the link between Dernel Green, Darren Green and Giovannie Green?

A credit pattern, and nothing more in the sources. The three names appear together in the backing vocals of “Body Language”, “Calendar Riddim 2025”, “Lè i Bon” and “Bye to de Old Me”, Giovannie Green also holding the bass, the synth bass or the live guitar, and Darren Green signing artwork. No source consulted says whether they are related, and this profile claims no family link: it publishes the recurring trio of credits, which forms, with Maskman, the stable sound workshop of Signal Band.

Where can I hear the work of Dernel Green?

Through “Bye to de Old Me” and “Body Language” by Signal Band and Shelly, “Black Girl Magic” by Starsha, which he produces, “Congratulations” and “RAGS” by Trilla-G, which he co-produces and engineers, then “Ani Ba Yo Love” and “Youngest & Baddest” for his composer beginnings. Our bouyon playlist and our bouyon producers page place those records back inside the current Dominican scene.

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