Let’s be Ghanaian in our music

Reggae Monk Shasha Marley, has complained that the type of music being produced by Ghanaian musicians is not being recognized internationally.

He said this was due mainly to the fact that most Ghanaian musicians leave the indigenous Ghanaian or African rhythms and attempt to do Western type of music.

According to Shasha Marley, international record labels would only recognize the works of Ghanaian artistes if the songs they do sounded Ghanaian.

“I’ve realized that the type of music we do in this country is not recognized internationally. Highlife music, which is the original Ghanaian music, used to be tagged as West African music. By then anytime you traveled out of this country, West African music was well recognized … now this is no more the case”, Shasha added.

The reggae monk said there was the need for Ghanaian musicians to inculcate African rhythms into their work.

He mentioned renowned African music legends like the late Fela Anikolakpo Kuti of Nigeria and Mariam Makeba of South Africa as people who earned a name for themselves by doing African Music.

Shasha Marley paid glowing tribute to artistes like Nana Ampadu, C.K. Mann, Kwabena Onyina among others, who did exceptionally well in taking Ghanaian music to the international stage.

Marley debunked the assertion that he himself was not doing African music. He said Reggae is nothing but pure African music which was started by slaves of African decent who had been dumped in Jamaica.

He said Raggae music had its roots in Africa, noting that currently Jamaicans do not do Reggae but Dance all music.