A CENTURY OF CHANGING LOCATONS OF GHANAIAN COMMERCIAL POPULAR ENTERTAINMENT VENUES

Historical Society of Ghana

A CENTURY OF CHANGING LOCATONS OF GHANAIAN COMMERCIAL POPULARENTERTAINMENT VENUESAuthor(s): John CollinsSource: Transactions of the Historical Society of Ghana, New Series, No. 10 (2006-2007), pp.149-170Published by: Historical Society of GhanaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41406737 .

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Transactions of the Historical Society of Ghana New Sériés, No. 10 (2006-2007), pp. 149-170.

A CENTURY OF CHANGING LOCATONS OF GHANAIAN COMMERCIAL POPULAR ENTERTAINMENT VENUES

John Collins

This article will present the changing venues and locations of Ghanaian popular music and drama since the late 19th century in a historical sequence that will also touch on the social class background of the performers and their audiences. And the first point to make is that there is a consensus amongst writers that the artists, actors and participants in early Ghanaian, and indeed sub- Saharan popular performance and art generally1, have usually come from what are called the 'intermediates' social groups that have emerged in Africa in between the national bourgeoisie and the vast class of subsistence farmers. These 'intermediates' were neither elite nor peasant, neither fully westernised nor fully traditional, but weťe rather cash-crop farmers and newly urbanised Africans who were semi-literate and perform semi-skilled work. Often these intermediates were highly mobile: as railway workers, taxi-drivers, messengers, postmen, migrant worker^, fishermen, seaman and stevedores. Also important were African soldiers Who served in the colonial armies abroad. Yet another intermediate group were young Africans who received some education and workshop experience from Christian

1 Ware (1978: 363) states that most of Sierra Leone's popular musicians come from the lower and middle classes whilst Alaja-Bťown (1987) notes thasst Nigérian juju music originated with the 'rascals' and area boys' of the old Saro (immigrant Sierra Leone) Olowogbowo quarter of Lagos. For southern and eastern Africa see Mitchell (1956), Ranger (1975:133) and Rycroft (1977:221). As Copian notes (1979/80 and 1985), this performing artist class actually had a local Zulu nâme in Söuth Africa: the abaphakathi òr 'those in the middle'. Barber (1987:29) provides the exattiples of Kenyan popular literature and the 'Onitisha market literature' of Nigeria in the 1950s to 1970s that was produced by and appealed to grammar school children, white collar workers, primary school teachers, traders* mechanics and taxi-drivers. Fabian and Fabian-Smith (1976:4) observe that the popular painting of Zaire's Shaba Province was created by a 'thin and fragile' socio-cultural sphere of lower level office dr trade employees, primary' school teachers and domestic helps.



150 JOHN COLLINS

missions. In southern Ghana for instance 'gentlemen drinking clubs' such as the Young Tigers of Winneba sprang up from in late I860 's that were critical of traditional authority.2 After the cocoa boom began in the 1870's mission trained 'scholars' participated in early fornis of popular trans-cultural music and dance (such as ashiko ahd osibisaaba)3 but were criticised by missionaries for drinking, using perfume and singing obscene songs. 4

Late 19th Century Adaha Brass Band Music: From Castle to Local Street The very earliest documented form of Ghanaian trans-cultural popular music was 'adaha', an Africanised form of fife-and-drum and brass-band music that appeared on the Fanti coast of Ghana in the 1880's. The British had set up Ghanaian regimental 'native orchestras'5 at Cape Coast Castle as early as the 1830's, but these did not lay local music. However, from 1873 between 5-7000 West Indians soldiers6 were stationed at Cape Coast and the neighbouring El Mina Castle to help the British in their San greti War against the inland Ashanti kingdom. These British Caribbean soldieťs had regimental brass-band, and in their spare-time they played Afro- Caribbean music. This acted as a catalyst for Ghanaian brass bands to indigenise their own music: by first copying the West Indians and then in the 1880's creating their own distinct adaha music.7

Adaha was a street-parade music and there were objections to it by the Europeans. In 1888 Reverend Kemp described the sound of drum-and-fife bands as 'tormenting' and warned that the danger of allowing Sunday school processions to be led by therh, as they would 'ultimately lead to the ballroom, the heathen dance and other worldly amusements'.8 Then in 1908 the District Commissioner of Cape Coast (A. Foulkes) put a curb on the five local brass bands of

2 Emmanuel Akyeampong, 1996. Pan- West African ashiko (or asiko) and Fanti osibisaaba evolved in coastal

areas around 1900. 4 Veit Arit, 2002. 5 Beecham,1841. 6 These West Indians were on three year duty (see Aboagye, 1999) and served in Ghana until around 1900. According to Attah Anan Mensah (unpublished 1969/70 manuscript) the

Ghanaians borrowed West Indian clave rhythms and calypso melodies such as the one that became the local Adaha song 'Everyone Likes Saturday Night'. An early adaha band that Mensah mentions was the Lion Soldiers Band. 0 Boonzajer-Flaes & Gales 1991, pages 13 and f/n 20, 22 and 38: quoting from Kemp's Nine Years in the Gold Coast , London 1898. Also see BoOnzajer- Flaes, 1999, 14 f/n 23.



GHANAIAN COMMERCIAL POPULAR ENTERTAINMENT VENUES 1 5 1

thjp town from playing their 'objectionable native tunes' as these led to competitive quarrelling, obstruction of roads, drinking9 and dancing.70 Despite these European protestations these local marching bands spread from the Fanti area and proliferated throughout in southern Ghana, and until the 1930's 11 they were the principal popular music ensembles of the Ghanaian urban areas.12

pre War Elite Ballroom Venues and the Origin of the Term 'Highlifç' From the street we now turn to the variety entertainment venues of the local elites. And the earliest documented example is the ťA Magic Costume Ball and Concert' held at the Cape Coast Castle Great Hall in 1903 for a mixed audience of local and European ballroom dancers.13 Later elite venues featured the ballroom and ragtime music of local dance orchestras such as the Excelsior Orchestra (fopned in 1914), followed by the Jazz Kings, Accra Orchestra, Cape Cpast Sugar Babies, Rag-a-jassbo, Ashanti Nkramo Orchestra, Winncba Orchestra, Sekondi Railway Silver Band and Nanshamaq (or Nansljamak) Orchestra. The members of these large and almost symphonic-like ensembles14 were educated in western type schools, could read music and were from the upper strata of Ghanaian society. Members of the Excelsior Orchestra, like the Torto brothers and Roger Chinery, were 'educated Africans'15 ; as were the Jazz

9 Jn 1882 there was also reports in the Gold Coast Times of drunkenness amongst West Indian troops Akyeampong, 1996, Chapter 3.

Letter from Pistrict Commissioner's Office, 16 march 1909, Ghana National Archives number 134e

During the 1930 the urban ballroom dance orchestras eclipsed the brass tyand. 1 In the Akan rural areas a 'poormans's variety of adaha marching music evolved during the 1930's called ( konkomď oť konkombď that did away with je^pensive brass band instruments, using rather local drums and voices. The Oa Equivalent was the kolomashie (i.e. 'colonial marchi

Fjrqm the Cape Coast Leader newspaper February 21,1903. Document donated to BAPMAF by Cathy Cole, Also see Cathy Cole 2001 p 64/5.

ßome ísUso played light classical music pieces. For instance. The Cape Coast JSugaf Babies was knpwn as the Cape Coast Light Orchestra when playing at art-muîc ponjcerts . 15 Personal communication with 78 year old Frank Torto (leader of the Orchestra) in December 1974. Chifl^ry later pn became the James Town Mantse (chief) Nii Krashie II ( Weekend Scene option of the Qfanpijanj Daily Graphic, 1st September, 1974, p. 10.



152 JOHN COLLINS

Kings' pianist Squire Addo and drummer Calab Quaye16 and the members of Teacher Lamptey's Accra Orchestra.17

Ballroom dances were often combined with other forms of entertainment at these local black elite venues, such as imitations of imported American vaudeville and British 'music-hall'18 as well as silent movies.

Venues for this high-class entertainment included the Victoria Hotel, Merry Villas,19 Rodger Club20 and Old Wesleyan School in Accra,21 as W^H as the Hamilton Hall in Cape Coast, the Domarch Club in Nsawam and the Optimism Club and Arkhurst Town Hall in Sekondi. 22 Also important were the 'soirees' or 'at homes'23 for the wealthy; an example being the weekend parties held at Temple House in James Town, Accra built around the turn of the century by the Ghanaian lawyer Thomas Hutton-Mills. I lived there in the 1970's and when the musician E.T. Mensah visited me he told me that because he had played there in the 1930s as a schoolboy member of the Accra Orchestra, he was still nervous of tfye place due to the 'high- ups' he had met there.

Another type of local Ghanaian elite venue were cinema houses such as Azuma Hpuse24, Saint Mary's Church Hall and Bartholomew's Cinema (part of the Merry Villas entertainment centre) in Accra and the Palladium Cinema in Sekondi. Added to these were the string of cinemas built in the mid-1920's by the Ada

16 Squire Addo told me (July 1973) that he obtained a degree at the London School of Music, whilst Calçb Quaye left the Jazz Kings play with Billy Cotton's big band in London. Addo also told me the orchestra sometimes played for Kuropean and West Indian businessmen. The musician King Bruce told me (1987 unpublished biography by Tlohn Collins ) that in

1950 the Accra Orchestra (formed 1932) consisted of teachers, engineers, traders, company clerks, government clerks and military personnel. ,x The two Ghanaian comics, the Two Macs, who performed at the Cape Coast Castle 'Magic Costume Ball and Concert' in 1903 may have been an early example. 14 Built in 1913 by the British John Holt-Bartholemew merchant trading company and according to Kofi Ghanaba (personal corrçmunication, 1975) linked to Chief Sertomey of the Accra based Ewe community. J) After Sir John Pickersgill Rodger, Governor of Ghana (then Gold Coast) from 1904-10. '' There was also the European club, which was according to musician Horace Djoleto a segregated club that in the late 1930's had an all white resident band called Pop Hotshots (sec Collins 1996, p. 7) 22 Built in 1915 in Sekondi, then the centre for railway administration (see Cole, 2001, p.76) ~ Mensah, unpublished 1969/70 manuscript. * Cole (2001:72) says this cinema was opened in 1910 but I have been told this house was showing lantern slide shows even earlier. Azuma House was the centre of the Accra Brazilian community, who caine to Ghana between the 1840's and 1880's.



GHANAIAN COMMERCIAL POPULAR ENTERTAINMENT VENUES 153

businessman Alfred Ocansey.25 His most well known was the Palladiujn cinema in James Town Accra.26 which, featured the comic duo of Williams and Marbel who tap- danced, sang rag-times and performed comic sketches in blackface minstrel attire.27 A little earlier (in 1918) Teacher Yalley was doing similar comic blackface sketches for his Tarkwî School Empire Day festivities (see Sutherland 1970). These local vaudeville performances sketches became known as /concert parties' and were, in the 1930's, hi-jacked from the elites and taken into the rural and provincial areas by Bob Johnson and the Axim Trio, who began the indigenisation of this popular theatre genre.

T)ie term ̂highlife' itself was coined during the 1920's in the context of these high-class ballroom and concert programs the orchestras began to include an occasional local folk-tune or street-song in their repertoires. However, the name as not coined by either the elite performers or well-to-do audiences, but by the poor. According to Yebuah Mensah, the leader of the Accra Rhythmic Orchestra (formed 1937), the term 'highlife' was originally a catch-name for the orchestrated 'indigenous songs' heard by people who gathered around exclusive clubs but did not reach the class of the couples going inside, who not only had to pay a relatively high entrance fee of about seven shillings and six-pence, bu): also had to wear full evening dress, including top-hat^ if they could afford it (see Collins 86:10). Attah Anan Mensah (1969/70:11/12) makes the similar observation that ̂ through the patronage of high ranking merchants and other local elite... enjoying the good life, the new musical type earned it's name.'

The first documented reference to liighlife' in a Ghanaian musical context was the "high life a la Tango' that was featured at the Railway Sports Çlub elite ball in Sekondi (Arkhurst Town Hall) in 19 14. 28 However, this word did nor refer to the Ghanaian music style. Indeed even in 1920 the name for local street music orchestrated by high-class

-jr, .jp , у .„Г1 , , J Г- 25 Such as the Palladium and Parks Cinema in Accra, the Mikado of Ns^w^n^, the Capital Cinema of Kpforidua and princess Cinema of Ççkpncji-Takoradi, Jipp Palladium was also occasionally used for European entertainment, such as the 1935

pantomime 'Zactyiria preç', produced by the then Gold Coast Governor, Sir Arnold Hodson. Information

from a portion of an (ynlqiown) Ghanaian newspaper of July 1959, No 19, with the J.Collins/BAPMAF

rnhivçs. 11 Personal communication A.A.S. Williams July 1973, James Town, Accra. ** Qo'4 CpastNatiofi newspaper article of June 11, 19Ц. entitled * Sekondce June 5 '

document donated tp J,ÇpÍ!jjns/BAPMAF archives by Cathy Cole).



154 JOHN COLLINS

ensembles like the Excelsior Orchestra was known as 'selections'.29 The very first documented use of the word "highlife'30 to describe the Ghanaian musical genre is from the 1925 program of the Cape Coast Literary and Social Club 'Grand Soiree' held a Hamilton Hall.31

Pre War Low- Class Urban Saloons and Rural Palm-Wine Bars Quite different from the ballroom dance venues were the urban dockside drinking spots and saloons that catered for local fishermen,32 stevedores and visiting seamen: including the famous Kroo (or Kru) mariners of Liberia who in the late 19th century and on the high seas pioneered the West African st}4es of guitar music33 that influenced early Fanti osibisaaha guitar/ accordion music.34 The most famous 1920 s exponent of osibisaaba was the Rumasi Trio that consisted of Kwame Asare (Jacob Sam) and two other Fantis (who all worked in Kumasi), and the -Fanti guitarist /accordion player George Williams Aingo.35 Examples of such working-class coastal bars in the port of Sekondi-Takoradi are the Liberia36 and Columbia bars mentioned by Emmanuel Akyeampong.37 The Ghanaian drummer Kofi Ghanab^ (Guy Warren) also refers to a pre-war saloon in James Town Accra called the Gold Coast Bar that was patronised by American and

29 In December 1974 Frank Tprto gave me a copy of his Excelsior Orchestra's Variety Entertainment Program (patron H.F. Ribeiro) held at the Old Wesleyan School at James Town on the 20th Nov. 1920, The repertoire inçludçd the highlifc (i.e. a 'selection' ) called 'Look Trouble'. The rest were imported: sue!) as banjo songs (White Coons and Ppsum's Picnic) Colonel Bogey, Sergeant of the Line, When thç Midnight Choo, The Jazz Craze, My Home in Kentucky, Serenado, That Mellow Melody, Pat O'Hara, Stars of the Summer Night and Arizona. 30 And 'blues' i.e. 'Akan blues' » a slow fprm of highlife sometimes in 6/8 time. 1 leid on 5 September 1 925 when the Rag-a-jazzbo Orchestra provided the music. Patrons

included the lawyer Thomas Hutton-Mills (who built Temple House) and the Honourable Casel'y-Hayford, an early nationalist writer, (document donated to J.Collins/BAPMAF archives by Nate Plageman in 2005) . The early coastal guitar /accordion form of proto-highlife known as

*osibisaabď got its name from the traditional ' osibi ' recreational dance of Fanti fishermen, 33 Kru sailors worked on commercial European (and later American) ships from the late 1 '8th century and in the early 20th developed music styles like 'mainline', 'dagomba wiya' and 'fireman' (i.e. steam-ship coal stoker) The highly mobile Kru 's also influenced other early African guitar styles: such as Pan West

African ashiko, Sierra Lconcan maringa and Yoruba juju-music. 35 The Kumasi Trio recorded in 1928 and Aingo in 1927: both for the British Zonophone Company. 36 This bar had a resident Taboo Brass Band (Akyeampong 1996: Chapter 5) 37 Akyeampong, 2000, pp. 222 ff.



GHANAIAN COMMERCIAL ГО PU LAR ENTERTAINMENT VENUES 1 55

British seamen. It was a low dive' that had swing doors and a band that used piano, horns and trap-drums.38

During the 1930'$ the coastal osibisibsaa and ashiko guitar/ accordion music spread into the agricultural southern heart- land of Ghana where thè guitar (being a relatively cheap imported instrument) gradually replaced the local Akaťi stringed instrument, the seprewa. However, as it did sö the guitar absorbed the modal playing style associated with this Akan harp-lute,39 whičh led to a mušic style known as 'odönson' о t 'Akan -blu e6' Like seprewa music, odonson was played both' at funerale and at village palmwirie spots,40 and so this acoustic guitar music also became known as 'palmwine music'. Also like seprewa niilsic this rustic, guitar style was not usually accompanied by dance, but rather provided a thoughtful proverbial commentary On life and death. Talmwine music' was so popular amongst rural Akans that a lucrative 'native record' industry sprang up in the 1930's'u, as farmers involved m cocoa and other cash-crops could afford to buy a wind-up gramophones and shellac records. Indeed this rural -guitar style Was also sometimes called 'cocoa-ase music', i.e. music listened to (live or on record) under the cocoa tree.

The Second World War and Its Influence on Ghanaian Night-Life During the Second World War many British and American allied troops were stationed in Ghaná, particularly after 1942 when the United States entered the war.42 As a result many swing-music bands were set up bý foreign soldièrs and Ghanaians to provide entertainment for the troops: such as Sergeant Leopard's Black and White Spots, the Tempos and the fireworks Four. Furthermore, and

38 Thè Ghanaian musiciatiò Ary ее played saxophone and Harry Dödoo played the drums and alfeo danced; the charle&ton, black bottom and tap- dancing. Information from Ghanaba's unpublished autobiography which I proof-read in 1975 for the Ghana based publisher, Jimmy Moxon . 39 Akan melodies dö not follow western ( I-1V-V) chord progression but move between two centťeš, a full tóne apart 40 A local alcoholic beverage made from the fermented sap of the palm-tree. 41 Akan palmwine/odonson music formed part of the eight- hundred-thousand West African 'native records' sold from 1930-33 by the British Zonophon£/HMV company (and Germán

Odeon company working out of Nigeria). Irtformation: personal communication with Leonard Petts< Head of

the EMÍ Archives, Hayes, Middlesex, 1979, Odeon reference see Chris Waterman, 1990:27 and 47. 42 The importance of Ghana to the war effort can be appreciated by the fact that Achimota College in Accra was prepared as a potential seat for an exiled British government and that according to Salm (2003:62 quoting Wendell P. Holbrook) between 1942-3 three hundred US planes were stopping at Accra for re-fuelling a day.



156 JOHN COLLINS

as Tempos member E.T. Mensah explains Avhen the Americans came bars began springing up during the war so that in any small corner there was a kiosk selling beer. They didn't mind sitting down and talking and listening to jazz and swing all night.'

The most popular spot for the American G.I.'s in Accra was a saloon bar called the Basshoun alongside the Old Kingsway on High Street, Accra. According to Guy Warren of the Fireworks Four it was a Svil'd bar' and E.T. Mensah comments43 that 'the effect of the Americans on the local women was appalling, they were free with them and thus encouraged prostitution at the Basshoun it was a nasty scene but fortunately it was closed down before the end of the war.' Other Accra wartime clubs of a less disreputable nature were the Weekend-in-Havana (owned by the Nigerian Mr. Morrison) the Accra Town Hall (now Parliament House), the Metropole, the Airport Lisbon Hotel, the Kit-Kat (owned by the Lebanese Mr. Ashkar) and the Sea-View Hotel.44 In Kumasi there was the Hotel de Kingsway built in 1941 by the Sierra Leonean Collinwood-Williams.45

With the de-mobilisation of the Allied troops at the end of the war the Tempos band became an all Ghanaian band, and under the leadership of E.T. Mensah it created a successful blend of swing music and local highlife music - as well as Afro-Cuban and calypso music introduced to Ghana through records.46 The swing influence on the Tempos resulted it becoming the first Ghanaian band to put professional women artists on stage, like Agnes Aryitey and July Okine.47 Indeed the Tempos was so innovative that it became the template for many Ghanaian and Nigerian bands, and its sound became the Zeitgeist for the early optimistic independence era.

At that very time the small acoustic osibisaaba and 'palm-wine' guitar bands were enlarged by E. К Nyame who, borrowing from the Tempos format, added trap-drums, double bass and Afro-Cuban bongos; thus creating what became known as 'guitar bands'. In 1952 E.K. Nyame went on to from the Akan Trio by adding a concert party theatrical group to his guitar band, and the resulting 'comic highlife' format became the model for all subsequent concert parties. E.K's

43 Collins, 1996, pp. 6/7. Accra's first hotel built in the late 19th century and which also put On

musical events. 45 Who before the war was leader of a Sierra Leone ragtime orchestra called the Dapa Dan Jazz Band and was concert party performer in Accra. 46 It was the Tempos drummer, Guy Warren, who first used Afro-Cuban percussion in Ghana.. 47 This féminisation was inspired by Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vamghan and the other great American female singers who were fronting the swing bands öf the time.




fusion of highlife and popular theatre completed the indigenisation of thé Concert party that began When Bob Johnson hijacked the genre froift the urban elites in the 1930's.

The Batly Independence Eta and Growth of Night-Spots for the Masses Highlife dahce bands, guitar-bands and concert parties actively supported the Ghana's independence struggle and Kwame Nkrumah's Convention Peoples Party (C.P.P). As a result, from the period of Ghana's internal self-rule (1952) and then full independence (1957) Prime Minister (later President) Nkrumah included popular entertainment as a vital component for developing a national and Pan identity. Indeed, as the C.P.P. Was a mass nationàlist party (compared to the earlier elitist United Gold Coast Cohvention Party), the popular performance of the masses was the perfect vehicle for projecting his deals to the general population.

In the 1950's Nkrumah transformed the segregated European Club48 into the headquarters of the National Arts Council, increased radio transmitting power one-hundred fold from it wartime level and established the Ghana Film Industry from the wartime Gold Coast Filrtt Unit.49 All of this positively impacted on the popular entertainment sector. In the 1950's and early 60's Nkrumah's C.P.P. government also utilised highlife bands for state functions50 and established many state highlife bands and concert parties itself; linked to the army, the Workers Brigade, the Builders Brigade, the Pármers Council and State Hotels.51 Furthermore, for those who tíould hot afford beer the government legalised the sale of a local liquoť (made from distilled palm-wine and called 'akpeteshie') that had been banned by the British. Indeed, by 1953 there were in Accra 344 bars, restaurants and hotels that were selling alcoholic drinks.52

48 In 194S Guy Warren, then playing with the Tempo's, had a racist confrontations with a white pátron at this exclusive club, as at the timé 'this was the sort of club where Africans were only seen padding about gently, dressed in white tunics' (i.e. as servants). See Collins, 1996, p. 9.

Both State radio (Ghana Broadcasting Company) and The Ghana Film Industry Corpbration featured popular plays sind band music. Television broadcasting (including of music) began in 1965 . 50 For instance E.K. Nyame's band and the Uhuru dance band accompanied Nkrumah on foreign visits . 51 Šuch as the Continental, Ambassador and Star Hotels in Accra, the Atlantic Hötel in Takoradi, the City Hotel in Kumasi and the Meridian in Tema. 52 Salm 2003: 1 70 quoting Acquah 1958.



158 JOHN COLLINS

There was a proliferation of dinking spots and night-clubs at which highlife bands performed. There were venues for the urban (and rural) poor that sold akpeteshie , and as will be mentioned later these hosted guitar bands and concert parties. Then there were the venues for both the middle classes and upwardly mobile urban masses, that sold imported liquor and local beer53 and featured the music of highlife dance bands modelled on the Tempos. These urban dance bands were considered modern and prestigious as their members could read music, wore suits and played a mixture of ballroom numbers, swing and highlifes. Although top-hats had gone out of fashion, the entrance rule for the clubs at which they performed was 'ladies strictly in frocks and gentlemen in tie.54 lone Acquah mentions that there nine of these clubs by 1956 and more appeared during in the 1960'S.55

Besides night-clubs, there were also numerous ballroom dancing clubs in the 1950's56 that catered for the upwardly mobile urbanités. Some located in Accra included the Rhythm and Sounds Club, the Accra Youngsters Dancing Club57 and the Trinity Dance Club. A National Association of Teachers of Dancing was also established, whose President was the C.P.P. Minister E. K. Dadson.58

High Status of Urban Hall Dance Bands and Low-Class Concert Bands As mentioned, the post-war dance bands and clubs that hosted them were of a relatively high status as compared to the rural oriented itinerant guitar bands and concert parties that will be discussed next. The dance band musicians were urban, wore smart

53 Beer was first manufactured locally in the late 1930's but from the 50's new breweries were established. 54 J.K. Nketia 1956:5: quoting an advertisement in the Ghanaian Daily Graphic of the 19th March, 1955 for the Weekend-in-Havana club program featuring the Delta Dandies band. 55 Besides the night-clubs already mentioned, others that were operating in Accra by the sixties were the Lido (of the Lebanese Shahim Brothers), Weekend-in-Miami, Kalamazoo, Tip-Toe Gardens, Weekend-in-Colorado, Royal Gardens, Weekend-in-California, Madison Square Gardens, Christmas-in-Egypt, Weekend-in-Florida, Pan-African Hotel, President Hotel, Silver Cup, Ringway Hotel (of President Akuffo-Addo), Caprice and E.T. Mensah's Paramount Club (later called Kyekyekus). Outside of Accra there were the Premier Hotel in Akim Oda , the Takoradi Zenith Hotel and the Wilben Hotel (of Mr. Hagan), Grand Hotel and Lido of Kumasi. For a good description of the ambiance of these clubs see Robert Raymond's 1960 book Black Star in the Wind.

By the early sixties these dance schools also taught the chachacha and rock 'n' roll. 57 Drum Magazine, March 1961 p 16/17. A September 1959 letter by this Association is with the J.Collins/ BAPMAF

archives.




clothes59 and could read music. Furthermore, many of them as youngsters had been trained in the pre-war elite dance orchestras,60 Avent to top-class schools61 or had professional careers outside of music.62 The status of these Ghanaian dance bands is reflected in the following comments by the Nigerian musician Segun Bucknor on the Tempos band, that toured his country in the 1950's. 'E.T. Mensah's music was liked by the people who took the English way, they were the first middle-class Ghanaians and Nigerians. There was a kind of snobbery, in that a man who was in a dance-bands felt himself to be nearer the white-man, as he would put on hat, tie and jacket, ̂ nd would t?e called to balls and formal occasions.'63

Despite this relatively high esteem of dance band musicians, and as the case of King Bruce exemplifies, there was an ambiguous attitude to them at governmental levels, especially after the overthrow of Nkrumah in 1966. Whilst King Эгисе had been running the Black Beats band from 1952 he had been slowly climbing up the civil service scale. Then in 1967 a government official informed him that unless he stopped playing dance-music in public he would not be promoted to full Principal Secretary of the Administrative Service. So to continue his civil service career Bruce had to stop performing. The government officer who wrote the 1967 letter later told Bruce that had he been the leader of a Anglican church choir or symphonic orchestra, rather than a popular music band, this performance ban on him would never have been made. 64

As compared to the urban dance bands and dancing clubs the status of the musicians who played in highlife 'guitar bands' (that evolved from pre-war osibisaaba and odonson groups) was of a distinctly low nature. These musicians could not read music, had humble occupations65 and were often considered to be palmwine

59 During the 1950's the oversize jackets, tight pants and loud neckties of ' zoot suits' were also becoming popular with young urbanités, introduced by American films that featured prtists such as Cab Calloway. See Steve Salm 2003. 60 Important dance band musicians such as E.T. Mensah, Tommy Grippman, Joe Kelly and Guy Warren were schoolboy member of the Accra Orchestra and Accra Rhythmic Orchestra. 61 Kofi Ghanaba and the co-founders qf the ßlack Beats dance bands, King Bruce and Saka Acquaye, attended the prestigious Achimota College

Guy Warren was a journalist, E.T. Mensah a pharmacist, King Bruce a civil servant, Saka Açquaye a teacher, Jerry Nansen (Ramblers band) a shop owner and Stan Piange (Uíjuru band) a bank worker. 63 See Collins 1985:137/8. 64 After 1967 he diverted his musical activities to managing eight bands, including the Black Beats under the leadership of Sammy Odoh. (King Bruce unpublished biography by John Collins, 1987) 65 The members of the Jaguar Jokers concert party with whom I worked between 1 969-73 (Collins, 1994) had been tailors, cobblers, carpenters, electricians, steward boys, builders,



160 JOHN COLLINS

drunkards. Furthermore, after E.K. Nyame's fused highlife and itinerant popular theatre in the early 1950'$, guitar band musicians also became considered as 'footloose'. Not surprisingly, the venues for the highlife operas put on by guitar bands-cum-concert parties from the 1950's were often of a humble nature. These groups travelled extensively 'on trek' by mini-bus66 into the rural areas where local compound houses67 were turned into theatres by utilising its internal courtyard to provide space for a temporary stage. Sometimes a house owner who regularly hosted concert groups would build a more permanent stage of cement. In either case the landlord would charge the concert party for this, with his or her tenants getting the benefit of a free show. The highlife guitarist Т.О. Jazz told me that Kwame Asare 's concert party in the late 1940's created an even simpler theatrical space, by making and performing in an ash circle in any convenient location (such as a lorry park) in a village or small town. Concert parties also played for the large numbers of rural migrants vyhq had settled in the towns, and here the performance locations would be cinema houses and open-air bars that served beer and akpeteshieč 8

An indication of the lowly status of the guitar t?and and concert party profession in the early 60's can be appreciated by the fact that they had a quite different union from those of the highlife and ballroom dance bands. There was the Ghana National Entertainments Association (GNEA) that catered for itinerant concert bands and stage magicians, whilst the Musicians Union of Ghana consisted of members of the more urban oriented dance bands whose members felt themselves a cut above the GNEA members, whom they considered to be illiterate TDUshmen'. Both these unions were dissolved in 1966, after the anti-Nkrumah coup, due to their links with his Conventions Peoples Party.69 The attitude of Ghanaian university students of the

timber-yard workers, border policemen and auditors. Leaders of other concert parties had an equivalent background: Kakaiku was a miner, Yebuah a tailor, Onyina a shoe-maker, Ç.|C. Mann a seaman and Kwaa Mensah a carpenter, mining surveyor assistant and watchmaker. 66 Large paintings or 'cartoons' of scenes from the plays were slung on the sifie of the bus and then propped outside of the venue for advertising purposes. Pre-show publicity was also done with printed posters. 67 A typical compound house, of which there are thousands in Ghana, is a rectangle of rooms surrounding a common court-yard with a single entrance to the outside; the perfect design for a small theatre. Sometimes old cocoa ware-house were used to stage plays

These local bars were often covered inside and out with rpurals depicting people enjoying themselves. M This schism re-surfaced for a while in the early 1970's when music unions werç re- established The new Musicians Union of Ghana (MUSIGA) recruited mainly danccrbfirçd member and the new generation of 'pop' band musicians, whilst the Ghana Cooperative Indigenous Musicians Society (GHACIMS) was formed specifically by concert pprty and




fifties and early sixties is also illuminating on the question of the differing status of dance bands and concert bands. For their end-of- term campus dances the students would invariably choose a dance bands such as the Tempos, Black Beats or Ramblers. Indeed this so worried a number of Ghanaian and expatriate lecturers70 who had formed the African Music Society, that they especially established a university palmwine drinking spot at Achimota College to cater for the guitar and concert party bands of E.K. Nyame, Onyina and Yamoah.

1960's to Mid70's: Congo Jazz, Western 'Pop', Afro-Music and 'Cultural9 Groups From the late fifties new external musical influences began to enter Ghana, these being 'Congo jazz' (' soukous ') from Central Africa71 and western 'pop music' such as rock ' n' roll, soul, disco and later reggae. The first band to introduce live Congo jazz to Ghana was Ignace de Souza's Black Santiagos (from the French-speaking Benin Republic) that in the mid 60 's was playing at the Metropole and Ringway Hotels. The imported 'pop music' fashion began with rock 'n' roll and the 'twist' that were introduced through records and films,72 like the 1957 'Rock Around the Clock', and Chubby Checker's 1962 Twist' and 1964 Twist Around the Clock'. As a result many rock 'n' roll dancing clubs were set up by Ga 'area boys' in Accra; such as the Black Eagles, Aces Harlem Club, Royal Rockers, Teen Town and All Yankees73 that played at traditional 'outdooring' (infant naming ceremonies) and funerals, the Accra Arts Centre and local night- clubs.74

Soul music became popular in Ghana during the late sixties75, and disco-music and reggae from the early seventies. Again film was an important avenue76 for these new imported western pop styles,

guitar-band artists. In the late 7Ò's however GHACIMS collapsed and its members joined MUSIGA. These included Prof. J.H.K. Nketia, Prof. Atta Annan Mensah and Dr.

Ephraim Amu of the Institute of African Studies, my own father E. F. Collins of the Philosophy Department and Robert Sprigge of the History Department. Also introduced through records and the powerful radio transmitter in

Brazzaville. 72 By 1963 there were 16 cinemas in Accra alone (Acquah 1958/72) Accra Survey. 73 See Salm 2003: 191 74 Ghana's first rock 'n' roll band was the Avengers formed in 1962 by Ghanaian soldiers returning from a training course in Britain. 75 The first West African band to play soul was Geraldo Pino 's Heartbeats of Sierra Leone that was resident band at the Ringway Hotel Accra in 1967 before leaving for Nigeria. 76 Like Jimmy Cliffs The Harder They Come'



162 JOHN COLLINS

and in some cases artists of these black music genres visited or played in Ghana.77 One impact on Ghana of soul and reggae, 'yi)th their Afro-centric, back-to-roots and "black and proudMyrics, was a wave of local experimentation which led to the emergence, frorn the late 1960's, of Afro-soul, Afro-funk, Afro-beat, Afro-rock and later local versions of reggae.

Important venues for the performance of these imported pop music styles and the various Afro-fusion styles that emerged from them were student 'pop chains' (i.e. competitions) that began to be organised during school holidays from 1966 by Faisal Helwani78 and also Dr Kpakpo Allotey at Baden Powell Hall. By the 1977 Fourth Annual Students Dance Band Music Contest79 held at the Aits Centre fifty- six schoolboy bands entered the preliminaries.80 Besides the student pop chains and rock 'n* roll dancing clubs of the lqLte sixties there was the growth of more night-clubs and discotheque that featured highlife, pop and local acts, and /or played irnpqrted 'disco'81 dance-music records. Some of the discos in Accr^ in the early 1970's included the Gondola, the Cave de Roi, Club Keteke, Blow Up, Club Edward, Pussy Cat, Moon Club, Club Jabela, Windmill, Flamingo Club, and Climax. One particularly impoft^ftf disco in Accra was the Pagoda (renamed the Napoleon Club in 197ß) whose owner, Faisal Helwani, featured Afro-rock and Afrorbçat played by the resident bands Hedzolleh, Basja-Basa, the Bur>zu$ &пй Edikanfo. 82

77 Jimmy Cliff visited Ghana in the early seventies whilst the soul artists Wilson Pickett, Ike and Tina Turner and Roberta Flack appealed at the to Soul concert held at Black Star Square in Accra in 1971. 7X Helwani himself endorsed a schoolboy group, the El Sombraros lee} by Johnny Opoku Acheampong and Alfred Bannerman. 79 16 July 1977 document with the J. Collins/ В АРМ AF archives. 80 Some schoolboy bands of the late 60's and 70's were the Road Runners, Deep ßlup? Feeling and Kuziuniks, (Achimota College), Blues Syndicate, Circuit five and Disco Jeens (Mfantsipim School), the Phantoms, Saints, Avalanches, Thundprbirds and Santa Clausfans (Adisadcl College), Mathew Chapter Five (St John's, Secondi), Bishops Candlesticks (Asankragwa School) and the Fampus Flames (Saint Augustine's) . Importar# artiçts w|ip passed through the pop chains include Glen Warren, $h^ha Cbfcippbi, PpStyipnd Ababio, Jagger Quartey, Maps Nkrumah, Re* Omar and AmamWbíi Nal Brew, Xl Diseco music js basicity black America soyl anf! fynl* mmwc a machine beat. The following is a list of nigjitçlybs and discos (b^nçls jn brackets) from lije Ghana Mirror

newspapers of June 197if. ACCRA/TE1V|A: Talk of tji^ Jown (TalkqMvçs), Moustapf)ř Р^ро (Lady Tamara), Fair Gardens (Funky Millionaire^ & В Soyaya), Çlub {ßw (Ctyap # Chiloo), High Society Lodge (Bçtty Brown <& Afrjcan Personality Тгоцре), Zçrp Rpoms (Wulomei), Rocky Hotel (Great Pilsners), ЛррЦо Theatre (Gqldçp ВегИр # P^ch Pçnplo*}, Grand Hotel (Ramblers & the Congolese Cavachf International), Club pod Hotel Extra О (Qreat Pilsners), Enp Hotel (Zaga Watyta), Miami Cafe (loniç Revolt Bity Brçw).



GkANAIAN COMMERCIAL POPULAR ENTERTAINMENT VENUES 163

During the early seventies another type of fusion-music emerged tailed 'Ga cultural music' that was created in Accra by bands such âá Wulomei, who played traditional Ga folk-songs and highlifes, uáing (with the exception of a highlife guitarist) only traditional instruments. Scores of such band appeared during the 7 O's that played the neo-traditional style pioneered by Wulomei.83 Not surprisingly this music became all the rage with local Ga population of Accra and was not only played at local ceremonies, but also on- stage at clubs and hotels. Indeed, in the mid to late-seventies a promotions outfit called 'Castle Santana' was specifically organising low-priced afternoon performances of 'Ga cultural' groups at clubs and cinemas near the sea-side, aimed at an audience of local Ga f&heftnérl and their families.

fié Late 1970's/ 1980's Demise of Live Music By the early seventies the Ghana music scene was at a high point. The country boasted over seventy functioning highlife guitar bands (cuiri concert parties), scores of private or state run highlife dance bands84 and literally hundreds of student groups pop groups and Afťo-rock/beat bands. Catering for these were numerous live music night-clubs (about 60 in Accra alone), schoolboy 'pop chains 'competitions, four recording studios and two local record pressing plants.85 Furthermore, during the early seventies two full length musical films were produced by Ghana Film Industry Corporation The 1970 4 Told You So' was based on a concert partly play and included the singer/actor Bob Cole and Nana Ampadu's African Bfother highlife guitar-band. This was followed in 1972 by *Doing îhëii4 Thing' that starred Charlotte Dade and the El Polios band and WÖ.S partly shot at the Apollo Theatre. A year earlier later another niùsical full-length film of the period, but made by an American còfripany, was the 'Soul To Soul' concert, shot at Black Star Square, i - - ■■ - - „ , . ... OUTSIDE ACCRA: Om Dwen Hotel Swedru (Great Pilsners), Tanokrom Club of Sunyani ánd the Continental of Berekum (4th Dimension), the Nkawkaw Topway Hotel (Dr. Gyasi's Noble Kings) änd the Asamankese Community Centre (Black Beats & Bona fi des).

To etňphasis their back-to-roots orientation, members of Wulomei and other áúch ťGa cultural' groups always perform in the traditional garb of the Ga ¿rieÄthoöd. 84 1 have made at provisional list of 192 guitar-bands/ concert parties and 104 hi&htifd dance-bands operating between 1950-1980. In the 1970's the highlife ftiusician King Bruce alone was running seven dance bands 85 Besides the previously mentioned Ambassador Records (built 1965), there was the Ghanaian /Polygram Record Manufacturers of Ghana established in 1^69 ih Accra that was pressing half a million singles and a hundred tilou sänci record albums a year.



164 JOHN COLLINS

one of the few times this areas was used for a popular music venue. The Ghanaian popular music and entertainment scene began to

wane from mid to late 1970's when there was a decline of the ovêrall Ghanaian economy due to the mismanagement and corruption ('kalabule') of the Colonel Acheampong and Akufo military regimes that had come to power in 1972. As the general economy deteriorated so did the commercial music sector, which finally ground to a halt in the late seventies when record manufacturing almost ceased and Ghanaian artists began to leave the country in droves.86 This was followed by a period of political instability (two military coups by J. J. Rawlings in 1979 and 1981) and a two-and-a- half-year night curfew (1982-4) that prevented night-time entertainment. This interregnum in the music industry between the late 1970' and 1984 was immediately followed by the imposition of huge import duties (160%) on band equipment and then music education was demoted in the school curriculum.

From the late 1980's and with the liberalisation of the economy and the country gradually moving towards civilian rule, the Ghanaian music scene slowly began to pick-up. However, by then many of the old-time 'classic' highlife bands, concert parties and pop bands had been permanently wiped-out and there was a consequent scarcity of live bands in the country. Other factors of a technological nature are also pertinent to the decline of live music bands and concert parties. One was the appearance of cheap-to-operate mobile discos or 'spinners' in the late 1970's that gradually took over the dance floors87 during the 1980's. Then there was the introduction of long-running television concert parties series; such as 'Osofo Dadzie' (from the mid-1970's) and 'Obra' (from 1982) and the emergence of commercial 'dialogue' cassettes of concert party music and comic acts.88 Moreover, it was during the 1980's that cheap-to-produce local video productions began in Ghana,89 and these, like the

86 In 1979, when I was on the executive of the Musicians Union of Ghana (MUSIGA), we estimated that one quarter of our members had left the country (mainly to Germany and Nigeria) . 87 Unlike the huge dance bands and concert parties, the spinners use less equipment and personel. 88 During the mid- 1980's I recorded several dialogue cassettes in my own Bokoor Studio; by the comedians Ruby Darling, Waterproof and Super O.D. with musician Eddie Donkor.

According to Nanabanyin Dadson (Mirror newspaper of 22nd Sept. 1995) by 1988 there were 375 video centres in Greater Accra renting out imported and local films, and between 1987 and 1995 about one hundred low-budget local video productions were made in Ghana. The very first of the local videos producer was William Nana Akuffo (see Meyer, 1998).




'spinners' went mobile, so gradually eclipsing live concert party in the rural and provincial areas.90

Rise of New Popular MusicGenres and Their Venues Despite the collapse of live popular entertainment during the late seventies and eighties, new musical entertainment genres emerged. The three most important of these are performance styles related to imported techno-pop styles (like disco and rap ), to the growth local church gospel music, and thirdly idioms that have a 'folkloric' focus; a trend encouraged by tourists and World Music' fans interested in Ghanaian traditional music and live dance bands.

Two local techno-pop styles have evolved in Ghana since the 1980's that through the usé of drum-machines and synthesisers have done away for the need for large and expensive to operate dance bandsv The first was *burgher highlife', a fusion of highlife and 'disco' music created in the early l§80*s by Ghanaian musicians (like George Darko and the Lumba Brothers) living in the German town of Hamburg. This studiò engineered music subsequently became popular in Ghana and its artists usually mime on stage. The second Ghanaian 'techno-pop' style was a local language rap called liiplife' (i.e. hip-hop highlife). This has evolved since the mid-1990's and practically does away with musicians altogether, as it only involves one artist rapping over backing-tracks made by a studio engineer. As a result hiplife is practically never performed live (i.e. 'free- styling') but is rather mimed on stage to pre-recorded music. The main outlet for both these forms of local 'techno-pop' is not live performances, but music videos and audio-recordings. In the latter case local burgher highlife and hiplife (together with imported disco-music, hip-hop and R&B) are played at small discotheque-type nightclubs that have multiplied over the years.91

Local gospel dance-music began to emerge from the very late 1970's, as with the downward turn in the Ghanaian economy92 many highlife and popular artists moved under the patronage of the

90 On the positive side, local videos do employ quite a number of concert party actors and actresses. List of such clubs (from Ghana Mirror, Dec. 21st 2002 & Dec. 24th 2003 and What's On

Ghana March-April 2006). ACCRA/TEMA: Boomerang, His Majesty, Krumplen, Glenn's, Tahari, Indigo, Tantra, Caesars, Warehouse, Yegoala, Temptations, Macumba, Celebrations, Oops and Bulldog. KUMASI: Fox Trap, Café Maseratti and Kiravi. TAKORAD1: Paragon and Ahenfe. BOLGATANGA: Soul Train. This is reminiscent of what happened in the United States during the

1930's depression when many African American blues and jazz artists (like Thomas Dorsey and Ethel Waters) moved into the black churches and helped create 'hot gospel' .



166 JOHN COLLINS

separatist African spiritual, apostolic, charismatic and pefttečostal churches that have multiplied since the 1950's93, and allow dancing for worship.94 As a result literally hundreds of gospel darlce baftds have sprung up in Ghana since the 1980's (many fronted by women singers) and this religious dance music now constitutes about sixty to seventy percent of the airplay and recording output Of the country.95 Obviously most of the live performances of the local gospel is done on church premises. However the local churches also put on evening gospel shows and competitions at ítiaríy of the cinemas that have, with the growth of video, closed down since the 1990's.

A third important development in the Ghanaian commercial music scene in the last fifteen years or so has resulted from the large numbers of tourists visiting Ghana. Twenty years ago there were literally no tourists in Ghana, but this has changed since the liberalisation of the economy in the late 1980's. In 2004, for instance, about 650,000 foreigners visited the country.96 Furthermore, because of the rise of World Music since the mid- eighties, many of these tourists are interested in the local pérforming arts, both live popular music and particularly traditional music and dance. As a result there has been the appearance of a number of venues that cater for commercialised traditional Yolkloric' groups. Most important are the private hotels and cultural centres that feature folkloric groups on stage and also teach foreigners local drumming and dancing. The first of these was the African Academy of Music and Arts (AAMA) a beach-side hotel at Kokrobite set up in 1988 by the Ga master drummer Mustapha Tettey Addy, followed by the late Godwin Agbele's (an Ewe master drummer) Dagbe Drum School at Kopeyia in the Volta Region.97 This foreign interest in local

93 These multiplied from a handful in the 1950's (see Acquah, 1958) to the 800 in 1991 that were registered with then National Commission on Culture's Religious Affairs Department. Today šome estimates the number ais high as 2000 separate denominations. 94 Also favouring the growth of local gospel is that, being charitable bodieš, the churches were not taxed and obtained instruments from abroad as gifts, 95 60% of local airplay according to the Christian Messenger newspaper vol. 9 1990, page 1/ 4. Agordah (2000:18) states that between 1992-96 70% of commercial cassette sales in Ghana were of local gospel. 96 According to Martin Mireko, Director of Ghana Tours (Graphic ShoWbiz, Í6- 24 May, 2006) 1,06200 tourists are expected in 2007, bringing with them 1,562 million dollars in foreign exchange . There are currently about twenty of these private commercial cultural centre in Ghana and

some others include the beach-side Kasapaa Centte at Nyanyano, Akoma Village in Accrä, the AGORO music NGO in Cape Coast, the Folkloric Drumming and Dance Schoöl at Nungiia,




music has also led to the emergence of several private or NGO music archives since the 1990's, the first being Kofi Ghanaba's (Guy Warren) African Heritage Library at Medie that is currently being assisted by the University of New York.98

As already noted, the late 1970's/ 1980's collapse of the Ghanaian commercial music-scene resulted in a drastic reduction of commercial night-clubs that catered for live local popular music performances. However some have survived and a few new ones have appeared that cater for live performances. In the Greater Accra Region, for instance, highlife performance regularly occur at the Bywel Club, the GBC (Ghana Broadcasting) Clubhouse, Chesters Place, the Next Door Beach Resort, the Dubois Memorial Centre and Amakyie Dede's Abrantie Spot; the latter being the only night-club owned by a Ghanaian musician. Particularly important is the cultural centre of the French Embassy, the Alliance Française, which риЦ on weekly shows of highlife and folkloric music performances, as well as occasional reggae acts. Local reggae (and folkloric music) fSf al$o featured at Big Millie's beach resort, Akoma Village and the Jehrah Restaraunt ,

Furthermore, since the 1990's live jazz clubs have emerged that especially cater for middle-class Ghanaians who have returned home after spending years abroad.^ These cosmopolitan and relatively well-ofi audiçnces enjoy small combos that play jazz, as well as Afro- jßZz and othep'fprsion music (Afro-beat and Afro-rock) at small and intimate Açcr^ clubs such as the Village Inn, Bass-line, Jazz Optimist Club. Odo Jazz Club, Diane's Café, and Tonie Maneison's Jazz-To&e Club; as well as at jazz nights at high-class hotels such as the Golden Tulip, Palmgroyeând, La Royal Palm.

It sji0uld be .added that there are currently a number of governmental or government supported venues that cater for a çrp$s-sec#o*i of Ghanaian performance, from live sho|ws of highlife,

tfif jKukyç Kufcye Bamboo Orchestra's cultural centre set-up in 1994 at Masdmogor village near Kakum Nature Reserve and Bernard Woma's (a master xylophone player) Dagara Music jtytó Arts Centre at Medie. Although not a private venture, the University of Ghana's Sphpol pf Pçrfowing Arts is also important, as hundreds of foreign students pass through it eaçh year. Qtber includeMhp Professor J.HJC. Nketia's International Centre for African Music and

D^cf antf Prpfespor John Collins's BAPMAF Popular Music Archives (both locatcd in Açfrç), K,wan*e S&rppng's (Jr&ipopljone Museum in Cape Coast, Kwese Asare 's African

Centre at Larteh, the Dagaaba Bewaa Centre at Cape Coast and Koo Nimo's Cinturai Cenjrp in Kumasi. * РцХ of Ghana's twenty twp million population about three million live

retuffiiwg pre often referred to as 'burgher's, i.e. having lived in н^пфцгф, Qtmmrr



168 JOHN COLLINS

gospel, reggae and folkloric music to mimed burgher highlife and hiplife, as well as international acts. Old venues that are still operating include the Accra Arts Council and Kumasi Cultural Centre that were both opened during the Nkrumah era, and the Trade Fair Site in Accra that began hosting performances in the 1970's. Then in the 1980's a National Theatre was built in Accra (by the Chinese)100 and various Centres for National Culture were established in the regional capitals. At the same time the 'Holy Gardens' was established at a space near one central Accra's major intersection, and the La (Labadi) Beach in Accra was taken over by the Ministry of Tourism who regularly put on seaside musical shows and 'meet me theirs*.101 In 1992 the Rawling's government initiated the bi-annual PANAFEST that was directed at tourists from the black diaspora, with its main performance venue being Cape Coast Castle. 102 This even^puts on performances by both local artists and stars from the Black Americas, such as Stevie Wonder, Rita Marley and Isaac Hayes. In the late 1990's the Rawling's government also launched an annual Emancipation Day that celebrates the ending of slavery in the Caribbean and includes performances at Accra's Children's Park.103 At this time some of the FM radio stations began an annual street carnival in Osu, Accra, which was endorsed by the city council.

Since the Kufour government came to power in 2000 two new developments have occurred which will have a positive impact on Ghanaian night-life, particularly the live music and performance sector. In 2004 the huge import-duties on musical instruments was reduced, and in 2005 the entertainment sector was integrated into the government's Poverty Reduction Strategy. The Ministry of Tourism threw its weight behind these initiatives at they believe these will encourage a resurgence of live music venues for folkloric music, old-time highlifes and other live acts that are attractive to the

100 This is one of the few places where concert party performances still regularly take place: a program that h^s been running for about fifteen years and is sponsored by Key Soap (a Unilever product). 101 The 'Holy' Gardens, National Theatre and Centre for National Culture were established in the early 1980's when the military regime of J.J. RawUngs was undertaking a short-lived 'cultural revolution '(from 1982 to about 1986) . The name 'holy' means dedicated to this cultural revolution. " In the early 1990 's some of the Caribbean visitQrs were upset by the use of Cape Coast Castle as an entertainment spot, for they considered this to be a too frivolous a location for a former slave dungeon. 103 Now called the Efua Sutherland Children's Park after the late Ghanaian playwright.




foreign visitors and *world music' fans coming to Ghanaian with precious foreign exchange..

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Aojuah lone. Accra Survey, University of London Press. 1958, revised 1972. Agordah, Alexander Akorlie. "Contemporary African Music in the Ghanaian

Church". Paper read at the Nordic African Institute conference, Playing with Identities in Contemporary Music in Africa, Turku /Abo Finland, 2000

Akyeampong, Emmanuel. Drink Power and Social Change , James Currey/ Oxford, 1996.

TT-. "Urbanization, Individualism and Gender Relations in Colonial Ghana 1900-1939". In: Africa's Urban Past , (ed) D. Anderson and R. Rathbone, James Currey and Heinemann, 2000, pp. 222ff.

Alaja-Brpwn, Afolabi. "From "Ere E Faaji Ti O Pariwo' to Ere E Faaji Alariwo': A Diachronie Study of Change in Juju Music". Paper read at the Fourth International Conference of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music, held in Accra, Ghana 12- 19th August, 1987

Aw, Veit, "The Scholars Dance: Popular Culture and the Appropriation of Christianity in the Gold Coast 1890-1919". Paper read at the Swiss Ethnomusicology Conference, Basel, June 2002.

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Bloomington and Indianapolis, 2001. £оЩп$, Ç. John. Highlife Time. Anansesem Press, Accra. First published J994, revised edition, 1996. -г, Music Makers of West Africa Three Continents Press, Washington DC, 19Э5.

The Ghanaian Concert Party: African Popular Entertainment at the Crßsßroadß. PhD, Dissertation, SUNY Buffalo. 1994. -, £. T. Mensah, the King of Highlife. Anansesem Press, Accra, 1996 Copian, David. In Township Tonight: South Africa's Black City Music and

Jbeqtre. Ravan Press, Johannesburg, South Africa, 1985. "Marabi Culture: Continuity and Transformation in African Music in Johannesburg 1920-1940". African Urban Studies , No. 49, Winter, 1979/80, pp, 49^75.



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Fabian, Johannes & Fabion- Szombati, Ilona. "Art, History and Society: Popular Painting in Shaba". In: Studies in the Anthropology of Visual Communication, 1976, pp. 1-21.

Holbrook, Wendell P. The Impact of the Second Wo rief War on the Gold Coast, i 939- J 95 7. Ph. d. dissertation, Princeton Universi ty> 1978.

Mensah, Attah Anann. "Highlife". Unpublished manuscript with the J , Collins/ BAPMAF muîc archives, Accra, 1969/70.

Meyer, Birgit. Popular Ghanaian Cinema and the African Heritage. Netherlands Foundation For Tropica! Research, 1998.

Mitchell, Clyde. "The Kalela pance". Rhode s- Livingstone Papers, no. 27, 1956.

Nketia, J. H. K. "The Gramophone and Contemporary African Music in the Gold Coast". Institute of Spcia] and Economic Research, University of Ibadan, 1956.

Ranger, Terence O. Dance and Society in Eastern Africa 189Q-197Q. Heinemanns, London, 1975.

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Rycroft, David. "Evidence of Stylistiç Continuity in Zulu Town' Music". In: Es$ay for a Humanist (Klaus Wachmann), Town House Press, New York, 1977, pp. 216-26Q.

Salm, Steve. The Bukom Boys; Subcultures and Identity Transformation in Accra Ghana. Ph. D dissertation for the University of Texas, 2003.

Sutherland, Efua. The Original Bob : The Story of Bob Johnson Ghana's Ace Comedian , Anowuo Educational Publications, Accra, Ghana, 1970.

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Waterman Çhris. Juju: A Social History and Ethnography of an African Popular Music. University pf Chicago Press, Chicago, 1990.



Documents

A CENTURY OF CHANGING LOCATONS OF GHANAIAN COMMERCIAL POPULAR ENTERTAINMENT VENUES