Demand your royalties - Bessa Simons

Accomplished Highlife musician and member of the legendary Osibisa group, Bessa Simons of “Belembe” fame has charged young talented musicians whose hit songs receive radio and TV air play, to be interested and ask questions about payment of their royalties.

He warned that, a chunk of their pensions are being eroded, as well as the financial support needed to develop their career.

He bemoaned the fruitless efforts made in the past to protect and reward intellectual property, saying, he is hopeful nonetheless that, the recently established Ghana Music Rights Organisation (GHAMRO), whose role it is to collect royalties will do a good job in resolving the problems of the creative arts industry, working collectively with MUSIGHA and the Copyright Office.

Contributing to a conversation on Tarzan’s Take on Multi TV, on the journey of highlife music, Bessa recounted the days when Ghana was very vibrant with lots of highlife musicians over a decade ago, saying that, the country became difficult economically, “hence many musicians are leaving the shores of Ghana because there was no night life.”

The exodus of drummers, artists, keyboardists, guitarists and other instrumentalists to Europe, gave rise to a new genre called Burger highlife.

This era gave birth to highlife icons such as Ben Brako, George Darko, Daddy Lumba, Nana Acheampong, Paapa Yankson, Jewel Ackah and many others.

The Internationalization of highlife, according to him, meant that highlife was now being played with synthesizers, drum machines and all kinds of modern gadgets. He further remarked that, fusion of highlife with other international music was the hallmark of Osibisa, which gained them international recognition.

Dr Charles Wereko Brobby, host of the programme was worried about the trend where musicians retired in poverty after many years of active service, and appealed to the sector Minister to enforce existing laws to protect the interests of creative artistes

Prof. John Collins, an author, musicologist and museum keeper, who was also guest on the programme, made reference to the practice in Nigeria where the music union, in a bid to ensure that musicians receive due payments for their works, strictly monitors and logs the number of times an artiste’s music is played on the airwaves . Defaulters are dragged to court, and action is taken to reward penalties.