Editing Highlife

{{Short description|Ghanaian musical genre}}
{{Other uses|High life (disambiguation)}}
{{Infobox music genre
| name              = Highlife
| image             =
| caption           = The King of highlife [[E.T. Mensah]]
| stylistic_origins = {{hlist|[[Palm-wine music]]|[[Akan people|Akan]] music|Akan folklore|other [[African music]] genres}}
| cultural_origins  = 1870s, [[Gold Coast (British colony)|Gold Coast]], [[British West Africa]] {{nowrap|(modern-day [[Ghana]])}}
| derivatives       = {{hlist|[[Makossa]]|[[Afrobeat]]|[[Hiplife]]}}
| fusiongenres      = [[Raglife]]
| regional_scenes   = [[Igbo Highlife]], [[Ijaw Highlife]], [[Edo Highlife]]
| other_topics      = 
}}

'''Highlife''' is a Ghanaian [[music genre]] that originated along the coastal cities of present-day [[Ghana]] in the 19th century, during its [[Gold Coast (region)|history as a colony]] of the British and through its trade routes in coastal areas. It encompasses multiple local fusions of African metre and western [[jazz]] melodies.<ref name="Collins-1989" /> It uses the melodic and main rhythmic structures of traditional African music, but is typically played with Western instruments. Highlife is characterized by [[jazz]]y [[Horn section|horns]] and [[guitar]]s which lead the band and its use of the two-finger plucking [[Guitar picking|guitar style]] that is typical of African music. Recently it has acquired an uptempo, synth-driven sound.<ref name="Eyre" /><ref name="Peñalosa" />

Highlife gained popularity and the genre spread throughout West African regions. Pioneers like [[Rex Lawson|Cardinal Rex Lawson]], [[E. T. Mensah|E.T. Mensah]], [[Victor Uwaifo]], all perfected this sound by infusing traditional Africa drums and western "Native Blues".<ref name="Collins-1989" /> After the Second World War its popularity came back within the [[Igbo people]] of [[Nigeria]], taking their own traditional guitar [[riff]]s and the influence of the diverse culture and flavour of Nigeria, mixed and perfected it to form [[Igbo highlife]] which became the country's most popular music genre in the 1960s.<ref name="SalmFalola2002" />

Highlife has remained a part of popular music for Ghanaians and [[Ghanaian diaspora|their diaspora]] globally through its integration with religious institutions and the positive effect it had on immigrating Ghanaians leaving their homeland.<ref name="Ruxandra-2014" />

==History==
The following [[arpeggio|arpeggiated]] highlife guitar part is modeled after an Afro-Cuban [[guajeo]].<ref name="Eyre">Eyre, Banning (2006: 9). "Highlife guitar example" ''Africa: Your Passport to a New World of Music''. Alfred Pub. {{ISBN|0-7390-2474-4}}</ref> The pattern of attack-points is nearly identical to the [[clave (rhythm)|3-2 ''clave motif'']] guajeo as shown below. The [[bell pattern]] known in [[Cuba]] as ''clave'' is indigenous to Ghana, and is used in highlife.<ref name="Peñalosa">Peñalosa, David (2010: 247). ''The Clave Matrix; Afro-Cuban Rhythm: Its Principles and African Origins''. Redway, CA: Bembe Inc. {{ISBN|1-886502-80-3}}.</ref>
[[File:Highlife guitar.tif|thumb|center|420px|Top: clave. Bottom: highlife guitar part ({{audio|Highlife guitar.mid|Play}}).]]

The origins of Highlife stem from colonialism and trading in West Africa through regional styles of music.

=== Palm wine music ===
[[Palm-wine music]], also known as maringa in Sierra Leone, was one style that originated on coastal locations when local musicians began using portable instruments brought by traders and fused it with local string and percussion instruments. It was usually played in a syncopated [[4/4 beat|4/4 metre]]. This music was played in low class palm-wine bars at ports where sailors, dock workers, and working class locals would drink and listen to the music. Eventually this genre worked its way inland and a more Africanized version came containing 12/8 [[polyrhythm]]s, this would be known as the "Native Blues". This style would gain popularity up until [[World War II]] when production of the records was stopped.<ref name="Collins-1989">{{Cite journal|last=Collins|first=John|date=1989|title=The Early History of West African Highlife Music|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/931273|journal=Popular Music|volume=8|issue=3|pages=221–230|doi=10.1017/S0261143000003524|jstor=931273|issn=0261-1430}}</ref>

=== Brass-band highlife ===
A style of highlife that resembled western [[brass bands]] in European forts across West Africa. The military would use local musicians in their brass band regiments and taught them linear [[March (music)|marching music]]. After these musicians saw how the West Indian regimental bandsmen practiced traditional music in their spare time it inspired them to do the same. The fusion of linear marching music with polyrhythmic local music created a danceable style called [[adaha]], as well as a style with cheaper, local instruments called konkoma. This fusion was similar to the birth of jazz in New Orleans.<ref name="Collins-1989" />

=== Dance and guitar band highlife ===
In the 1920s, Ghanaian musicians incorporated foreign influences like the [[foxtrot]] and [[calypso music|calypso]] with Ghanaian rhythms like ''osibisaba'' ([[Fante people|Fante]]).<ref name="SalmFalola2002">{{cite book|last1=Salm|first1=Steven J.|last2=Falola|first2=Toyin|title=Culture and Customs of Ghana|url=https://archive.org/details/culturecustomsof00salm|url-access=registration|access-date=30 May 2017|year=2002|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|isbn=9780313320507|pages=[https://archive.org/details/culturecustomsof00salm/page/181 181]–185}}</ref> Highlife was associated with the local African aristocracy during the colonial period, and was played by numerous bands including the [[Jazz Kings]], [[Cape Coast Sugar Babies]], and [[Accra]] Orchestra along the country's coast.<ref name="SalmFalola2002" /> The high class audience members who enjoyed the music in select clubs gave the music its name. The dance orchestra leader [[Yebuah Mensah]] ([[E.T. Mensah]]'s older brother) told [[John Collins (musician/researcher)|John Collins]] in 1973 that the term 'highlife' appeared in the early 1920s "as a catch-phrase for the orchestrated indigenous songs played at [exclusive] clubs by such early dance bands as the Jazz Kings, the Cape Coast Sugar Babies, the Sekondi Nanshamang and later the Accra Orchestra. The people outside called it the highlife as they did not reach the class of the couples going inside, who not only had to pay a relatively high entrance fee of about 7s 6d (seven shillings and sixpence), but also had to wear full evening dress, including top-hats if they could afford it."<ref>{{Cite book|title=E. T. Mensah: King of Highlife|last=Collins|first=John|publisher=Off The Record Press|year=1986|location=London|pages=10}}</ref> From the 1930s, highlife spread via Ghanaian workers to [[Sierra Leone]], [[Liberia]], [[Nigeria]] and [[Gambia]] among other West African countries, where the music quickly gained popularity.

[[File:Armstrong-Mensahinvitation.jpg|thumb|An invitation to a concert featuring Louis Armstrong "from America" and E. T. Mensah and his Tempos Band "of West African Fame"]]

In the 1940s, the music diverged into two distinct streams: dance band highlife and guitar band highlife. Guitar band highlife featured smaller bands and, at least initially, was most common in rural areas. Because of the history of stringed instruments like the [[seprewa]] in the region, musicians were happy to incorporate the guitar. They also used the ''dagomba'' style, borrowed from [[Kru people|Kru]] sailors from Liberia, to create highlife's two-finger picking style.<ref name="SalmFalola2002" /> Guitar band highlife also featured singing, drums and claves. [[E.K. Nyame]] and his Akan Trio helped to popularize guitar band highlife,<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=yIHfybGz5HoC&q=ek+nyame&pg=PA21 Musicmakers of West] 1985 publisher Lynne Rienner Publishers {{ISBN|978-0-89410-075-8}}</ref> and would release over 400 records during Nyame's lifetime.<ref name="SalmFalola2002" /> Dance band highlife, by contrast, was more rooted in urban settings. In the post-war period, larger dance orchestras began to be replaced by smaller professional dance bands, typified by the success of E.T. Mensah and the Tempos. As foreign troops departed, the primary audiences became increasingly Ghanaian, and the music changed to cater to their tastes. Mensah's fame soared after he played with [[Louis Armstrong]] in Accra in May 1956, and he eventually earned the nickname, the "King of Highlife".<ref name="SalmFalola2002" /> Also important from the 1950s onward was musician [[King Bruce]], who served as band leader to the Black Beats. Some other early bands were, the Red Spots, the Rhythm Aces, the Ramblers and Broadway-Uhuru.

=== The Ghanaian diaspora ===
Economic problems led to a mass migration of Ghanaians in the 1960s looking for more opportunities and after that political instability in the '70s and '80s would cause more people and many prominent highlife musicians to leave and create clusters of communities across the west with Germany being a preferred destination because of [[Immigration to Germany|its relaxed immigration laws]].<ref name="Ruxandra-2014">{{Cite book|last=Ruxandra|first=Krüger, Simone Trandafoiu|url=http://worldcat.org/oclc/900017261|title=The globalization of musics in transit : music migration and tourism|date=2014|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-0-415-64007-7|pages=252–266|oclc=900017261}}</ref>

==== Burger highlife ====
Ghanaians in Germany created a secular style of highlife that combined the genre with funk, disco, and synth-pop. It is believed it was called burger highlife because the largest communities of Ghanaians resided in [[Hamburg]]. The music became associated with migrants who would travel between Germany and Ghana. It also would become defined by its use of modern technologies; by the late '90s, productions used solely electronic instruments.

==== Gospel highlife ====
Considered one of the most popular music genres to both Ghanaians and its diaspora, gospel highlife has outlived burger highlife because of its success in blurring the lines between religion and pop culture. This genre is similar to burger highlife but its inspiration comes from [[Charismatic Christianity]] and [[Pentecostalism]]. Its significance within the communities stems from the religious institution's ability to provide social and cultural infrastructure for the Ghanaian diaspora in Germany.

==Jazz in Ghana==
{{more citations needed section|date=December 2018}}

=== 1950s ===
E.T. Mensah and [[Guy Warren|Kofi Ghanaba]] were important musicians in Ghana. From the late 1950s, famous jazz musicians began to visit Ghana, such as [[Ahmad Jamal]] and Louis Armstrong who played in Ghana (1956 and 1960). Armstrong's All Stars member Edmond Hall came to Ghana in 1959 to set up a short-lived jazz in Accra.

[[Guy Warren]] was one notable musician who played with E.T. Mensah and the Tempos before moving to America and working with musicians such as [[Red Saunders (musician)|Red Saunders]] to record the album ''Africa Speaks, America Answers'', as well as playing with Duke Ellington in Chicago for a short time. Warren is credited with introducing highlife to the United States in an attempt to bring [[African-American music]]ians back in touch with the music of Africa, as awareness of African influence on Afro-American music was lacking before the "African musical renaissance" of the late '50s.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Kelley|first=Robin D. G.|date=2012-03-01|title=Africa Speaks, America Answers|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674065246|pages=11–40|doi=10.4159/harvard.9780674065246|isbn=9780674046245}}</ref>

=== Musical examples ===

Source:<ref>[https://www.musicinafrica.net/magazine/jazz-ghana Jazz in Ghana] Retrieved 27 January 2021</ref>

* Pianist [[Randy Weston]] recorded an album called ''Highlife'' in 1963, featuring compositions by West African musicians [[Bobby Benson]] ("Niger Mambo") and [[Guy Warren]] (Kofi Ghanaba) ("Mystery of Love").
* Saxophonist [[Pharoah Sanders]] recorded a song called "High Life" on ''[[Rejoice (Pharoah Sanders album)|Rejoice]]'' (1981).
* Guitarist [[Sonny Sharrock]] had a song called "Highlife" on the [[Highlife (Sonny Sharrock album)|album of the same name]] (1990).
* [[Craig S. Harris (trombonist)|Craig Harris]] (trombone) had a song called "High Life" on the album ''[[F-Stops]]'' (1993).

== See also ==
*[[Ghanaian Highlife Forms]]

==References==
{{Reflist|30em}}
{{Commons category}}

==Further reading==
* {{cite book |author-first=John |author-last=Collins |title=Music Makers of West Africa |publisher=Three Continents Press |location=Washington (DC) |year=1985 |isbn=0-89410-076-9 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/musicmakersofwes00coll }}  also Colorado:Passeggiata Press.
* {{cite book|author-first=John |author-last=Collins |title=West African Pop Roots |publisher= Temple University Press |location= Philadelphia |year= 1992 |isbn=0-87722-916-3}}
* {{cite book|author-first=John |author-last=Collins |title=E. T. Mensah King of Highlife |publisher= Anansesem |year= 1996 |isbn=9-98855-217-3}}
* {{cite book|author-first=John |author-last=Collins |title=Highlife Giants: West African Dance Band Pioneers |publisher= Cassava Republic Press |location= Abuja (Nigeria) |year= 2016 |isbn=978-978-50238-1-7}}

{{Genres of African popular music}}
{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Highlife| ]]
[[Category:African popular music]]
[[Category:Ghanaian styles of music]]