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                                   KENYATTA UNIVERSITY 
                                MDT 224 WORLD MUSIC TRADITIONS
                                 VICTOR MANGI YAA   M25/3150/2022
                                      RESEARCH PROJECT 

THE ORIGIN OF HIGHLIFE MUSIC 

In the Igbo world, the world is music and the music is the world, The universe is music, even ‘Chineke’ the creator of the universe is said to be a dancing deity moving and acting through vibration, frequency, sound, and light.

Highlife - is a style of music that originated in Ghana in the late 19th century, and later spread to western Nigeria. It uses a calypso-like tune backed by a combination of Western and traditional African instruments it is Commonly regarded as Richman's music.

Origin of Highlife music

After Ghana gained its independence from the British, it began reforming its society under the combined teachings of Marcus Garvey and W.E.B. Dubois, the man who brought Ghana independence, and Kwame Nkrumah, the man of outside colonial jails. Immediately Ghana fever swept through, and Kwame Nkrumah became a folk hero across the board for Africa as a whole.

Anything Ghanian became celebrated as a symbol of the new Africa that demanded its fashion leading to a flood of Ghanaian tailors across Igbo land primarily the city of Abba. But the most lasting impact of this Ghana fever of the 1950s was the introduction of Ghana's new urban modern take on African music. 

While versions of big bands existed throughout Africa, the Caribbean, and North America, the Ghananian big bands which were known as highlife used a mixture of Black American jazz, big bands, and African sounds from genres of African traditional Ghanaian music, this created a music that would become a theme for a generation that was hungry for independence.

Night clubs in Nigeria's emerging cities became the exclusive hideout for this new release as artists toured in cities like Lagos and Enugu. In its inception, the sound was generally formless describing any African mixture of African music in big bands where one could hear aspects of Latin America and the Caribbean. The urban elite are the ones who made these sounds their music. Its main patrons were individuals who could afford vinyl record players and the Western clothes necessary to fit into the emerging club scenes. For men these were the gentlemen, young aristocrats modeled after the European ideal and tailored European clothes, read newspapers and drove cars around, spoke impeccable english, and worked and lived in the city. Young ‘evil’ people would leave Igbo land and settle in new places such as Lagos and Ibadan where they would establish their own independent lives away from their native homes. For the women, they were educated and up-to-date on global fashion. These gentlemen and ladies were unlike their parents and therefore, often received criticism from their parents since their worldview was global such people were the custodians of highlife music.

Impact of Rex Lawson on Highlife music

Rex Lawson changed the face of highlife music more than any person before him and anybody after. He sang so many songs that his fans nicknamed him the Cardinal which he would add to his full stage name Cardinal Rex Lawson. He grew up in Iguasha, presently known as Port Harcourt, This is where he studied music in the church, he grew up as a rebellious child constantly getting in trouble violating the rules of his mission school and sneaking away to go listen and play music with a group of Nigerian and Ghanaian musicians. All these musicians were practicing/playing the big band style of highlife that he would grow to revolutionize. Rex Lawson began his style of highlife after learning from his predecessors. His style reduced the amount of Western big-band influence such as Instruments and idioms and increased the amount of African ones, this is what made his style of highlife popular since much of the audience gravitated more towards a native sound. He also infused the Congolese plucked guitar from central Africa into his highlife, and until today this exact guitar style is the key signature for the highlife music in general. Furthermore, he brought back the passion and emotions that were previously missing in the Ghanaian blend of highlife music, according to him passion and emotions were crucial features in African music.

Many times Cardinal Rex Lawson would cry or tear up while performing his songs despite the mood of the song being particularly not sad. All these features created his new highlife sound, therefore, he quickly became the biggest artist in Africa selling out records and vinyl in Ghana, Nigeria, Congo, Cameroon, and the whole of West Africa.

His lyrics became standards in the genre as well, hundreds of artists did Rex Lawson’s covers with their spin. For instance, phrases such as “bonsuee Azikiwe” and ‘sawa sawa sawale’ have been used often in Nigerian music. Have you ever heard of the song 'Nwa Baby' by Flavour whose lyrics hit all the corners of Africa and gained sixty-nine million YouTube views, did you know it is a cover from Rex-Lawson’s song ‘Sawale?'

Rex Lawson's pivot towards African style and sounds made him the king of Highlife music in the 1950s and 1960s this is because, this pivot struck a nerve in Nigeria in spiritual, musical, cultural, and most importantly political aspects.

Role of highlife music in politics

By 1949 The British Empire had been bankrupted by World War II, it began seizing and confiscating the wages of African employees but neither refused to discharge them from work nor reduce the labour intensity. Consequently, a group of coal miners in the city of Enugu staged a peaceful protest for unpaid wages. At the end of the peaceful protest, the British opened fire on the Coal miners killing twenty-one people, this resulted in miners tying red ribbons and scarves around their heads to show workers' solidarity. Nnamdi Benjamin Azikiwe a pan-Africanist, took the press writing about the Iva Valley Massacre, this united the Nigerians to focus on their independence. His investigative journalism, as well as his writings on black supremacy and workers' rights, led to a series of arrests and assassination attempts against him. On the other hand, highlife music such as Bonsue Azikiwe by Cardinal Rex Lawson supported his work and built his reputation as a legend. The British therefore relented on assassinating him due to fear of losing popularity from the Africans.

In conclusion, the evolution of music in Nigeria during the growth of highlife reflects not only a divergence between the East and West regions but also a concerted effort to reclaim and celebrate African identity. Through the rise of afro-beats in Fela's territory and the decline of brass sounds in the east where highlife music was dormant. A deliberate re-Africanization of musical approaches emerged where native languages, traditional instruments such as ‘kidi’ the talking drums, and a rejection of Western standards became central themes, serving as a powerful tool for cultural revitalization and a call for authenticity. This period in Nigerian music history underscores the enduring spirit of African creativity and resilience in the face of cultural homogenization.

Reference

Cardinal Rex Jim Lawson - Topic. Sawale, 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rSqfuu-wvs.

Jahanpour, Farhang. “Lost in the Crowd. By Jalal Al-e Ahmad. Translated by John Green with Ahmad Alizadeh and Farzin Yazdanfar. Washington, D.C.: Three Continents Press, 1985.” Iranian Studies 18, no. 2–4 (1985): 449–58. https://doi.org/10.1080/S0021086200007829.

Object, object. “Highlife and Its Roots: Negotiating the Social, Cultural, and Musical Continuities between Popular and Traditional Music in Ghana.” Accessed April 15, 2024. https://core.ac.uk/reader/46725220.

Official Flavour. Flavour - Nwa Baby (Ashawo Remix) [Official Video], 2011. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMSTYtMSbL0.

“The History and Evolution of Highlife Music: A Fusion of | Course Hero.” Accessed April 15, 2024. https://www.coursehero.com/file/150169433/Highlife-Music-Essaydocx/.