Nana Ama Adadziewaa!: The Voice Behind Popular Hit Songs in Ghana?

Abstract

In this paper, we unravel the personality, musical exploits, challenges and contribution of Nana Ama Adadziewaa, Ghana’s iconic female background vocalist to the music industry. Using interviews, documents and audio reviews for data collection, we reveal that Nana Ama Adadziewaa’s voice is behind a corpus of popular hit songs in Ghana. Furthermore, her voice is heard on the Ghanaian airwaves nearly every day; however, this does not bring her any economic gains due to Ghana's poor royalty collection system. We conclude by eulogising Nana Ama Adadziewaa as a model of excellence in the background vocals of Ghanaian popular music and a significant contributor to the Ghanaian music industry. Subsequently, we recommend that the Ghana Music Right Organisation (GHAMRO) and relevant stakeholders enhance the royalty collection system in Ghana so that Nana Ama Adadziewaa and her contemporaries benefit as a matter of urgency from their hard work.