Legendary rapper, Gyedu-Blay Ambolley says the current musicians have turned the highlife and Hiplife music upsidedown, which in turn has made Ghana lose its musical identity on the international market.
According to him, the current musicians have lost their African musical roots to follow the foreign music.
Speaking in an interview with Max Drive in Accra on Tuesday, the “Simigwa” hitmaker explained that the generation has abandoned the highlife musical root to embrace the branches of sounds that were deeply rooted in Highlife and Hiplife music of Ghana.
“My rap is based on our route which is ethnicity and culture. You can identify the rhythm behind it: the tata-ta-tata. That’s our basic highlife sound with rhythm, but this current generation uses American or Jamaican dancehall beats, and then they rap on it.”
“The mere fact that they hear their music being played in clubs and on radio stations they feel that they have done something extraordinary, but they have lost their musical identity,” he explained.
Ambolley underscored the need for the generation to create from the cultural rhythmic sound to give an identity to Ghanaian music.
That, he noted, would help Ghanaian music to be identified properly on the international market to attract investors, stressing that “much work must be devoted into our music presentations so that our music can be easily recognized.”
Source: Ghana/MaxTV/MaxFM/max.com.gh/Joyceline Natally Cudjoe