Highlife artiste, Dada Hafco, says Ghanaian musicians risk living in the shadow of Nigerians when they make Afrobeats music.
According to him, although Ghanaians are free to do whatever genre of music they like, Nigerians have claimed Afrobeats across the world and have set a national agenda to ensure that almost all their artistes make the same genre of music.
Thus, in many foreign countries people assume artistes who make Afrobeats music are all Nigerians, he said on Daybreak Hitz on Hitz FM, on Friday, adding that the beloved genre has become synonymous with Nigeria.
“Today the Nigerians have taken over Afrobeats. If you do Afrobeats today you live in the shadows of Nigeria, that is a fact. Because now they are claiming it worldwide, so, when you do Afrobeats everybody might think you come from Nigeria.
“Unless the person knows you personally and where you come from, if you are performing on a foreign soil somewhere, the moment the one drop lands everybody knows where it is coming from,” he said.
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The ‘Our Story’ crooner stated that Ghanaians are fond of borrowing culture and trying to make it theirs, adding that, that is what is happening in the music industry currently.
Dada Hafco told Andy Dosty, host of the show, that “we sort of love to do what others are doing, instead of focusing on what we can do and do it better.”
He explained that just like Nigerians and other countries including Jamaica, South Africa and the United States, Ghana needs to have a national agenda that helps create an identity for the music industry with Highlife music.
Dada Hafco said that Ghanaians cannot begin to explain the many genres artistes are doing every time they are asked what music identifies Ghana.
“When Hiplife started, remember at the time once you are young we were calling every musician a Hiplife artiste, and that is what Nigeria is doing today. We need an identity for Ghana music.
“At the end of the day we can have so many genres in Ghana people should do whatever they want to do, but when it comes to an identity we need to be identified with a particular genre.”