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With the dominance of foreign music genres in the Ghanaian music industry, including the relatively recent Afrobeats, there has been worries that the country\u2019s long-standing music genre, Highlife, may succumb to their pressures.<\/p>\n
But veteran musician Bessa Simons remains positive the Highlife genre will continue to thrive.<\/p>\n
He thinks that other genres that surfaced in times past and appeared to be doing well, eventually faded away because they lacked the specific characteristics and firm basis that Highlife had built over the years to become a bedrock genre.<\/p>\n
In a recent interview with\u00a0Graphic ,<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0he argued that there had been pioneers who had established the Highlife space and left a solid foundation, as well as a purposeful ongoing effort by some Highlife artistes to hold the fort so that the genre would survive.<\/p>\n\u201cHighlife will always stand the test of time because of its distinctive elements and how some of our new crop of artistes are carrying it along, just like what our pacesetters of Highlife music did,\u201d Bessa Simons said.<\/p>\n
He noted that \u201cAzonto came and it faded out in no time and we have equally had some of these trends that metamorphosed into a certain genre and they also faded out. But with our Highlife genre, it has stood the test of time in the presence of all of these.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cSome of our new crop of artistes like Akwaboah Junior does it so well and he has always been one person I use to describe what Highlife music is to people who are not so familiar with the genre. Akwaboah particularly, and a few others, do it so well. They use the right instruments and sing it exactly how it should be sung,\u201d he stressed.<\/p>\n
When asked what efforts were being made to consolidate this journey of making Ghana\u2019s bedrock music genre stand tall, the former member of Osibisa held that stakeholders in the music industry had initiated processes of getting the Highlife genre inked down as part of Ghana\u2019s intangible cultural heritage.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can\u2019t downplay the role of our industry stakeholders, because efforts are being made by relevant stakeholders to make the Highlife genre a part of Ghana\u2019s intangible cultural heritage. This will mean that we have solidified the genre and with a little push from our artistes and those of us involved in the chain, we will be good to go,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Bessa Simons, who is a multi-talented musician with more than 40 years of mentorship and practical music experience, urged the next generation of Highlife artistes who are veering off the genre\u2019s defining features to pay close attention to it and work to keep it alive.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome of the new crop of artistes are doing well while others are not really projecting it as it should be and they are rather adding too much foreign flair, which even makes it difficult for us to tell exactly what genre or style of music they are portraying.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bessa Simons added that the new crop of Highlife artistes should consistently incorporate distinctive features of the genre \u201clike the way we sing Highlife, the instruments, and make use of them because that is what we are missing now.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOne thing that makes Highlife distinct is the use of guitars and percussions like the xylophone, cymbals, triangle, snare drum, bass drum, tambourine, maracas, gongs, chimes, celesta and piano, and make more use of them because they play important roles and define our Highlife genre,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
DISCLAIMER: <\/strong>The Views, Comments, Opinions, Contributions and Statements made by Readers and Contributors on this platform do not necessarily represent the views or policy of Multimedia Group Limited.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With the dominance of foreign music genres in the Ghanaian music industry, including the relatively recent Afrobeats, there has been worries that the country\u2019s long-standing music genre, Highlife, may succumb to their pressures. But veteran musician Bessa Simons remains positive the Highlife genre will continue to thrive. He thinks that other genres that surfaced in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":58778,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-58777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment"],"yoast_head":"\n
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