To say I know of any entertainment event in Ghana that would defeat the Ghana Music Awards scheme as far as controversy and bickering is concerned, will be like telling the greatest lie ever.

It will be gross understatement to only say the scheme is the most talked about event in the country currently, as a matter of fact, it’s the biggest entertainment show in the Ghanaian calendar and the most sought after event to bring together major players in the music industry in Ghana.

Undoubtedly, the Ghana Music Awards over the years has been embraced by Ghanaians as a means of appreciating Ghanaian music and awarding its deserved players. The scheme is a hot cake. What makes it hot is the fact that, it’s the only entertainment event in Ghana that tickets to the events gets sold out days to the event. Charterhouse will always be parted at the back for having been able to hold the fort and still have been able to keep sole aim of the dreams; awarding deserving musicians.

To say everything has been perfect since the introduction of the awards in Ghana some 11 years ago will amount to insulting and throwing dust into people’s eyes, since various problems and shortcoming of the awards has been noticed over and over again. But as to if the anomaly has been corrected is another issue. Humans are fallible, one might say but it doesn’t preclude one from aiming to getting it right all the time.

GMA 2011 can best be described in one word; BORING! It was less an improvement on last year’s edition which shouldn’t have been the case. I can choose to remain silent on what I thought went wrong but then posterity will not forgive me. Democracy is good, so I will free my mind.

If you watched the show on TV, you are free to think everything went on well but I was live at the venue and saw everything with my ‘naked’ eyes. Of all the awards given on the night, I managed to get 10 predictions right. Not so impressive I know.

This article you are reading is captioned ‘Ghana Music Awards 2011: The Good, The Bad And The So Ugly’ for a reason. I will be reviewing the show from my perspective. But don’t forget, this year’s show was boring. Here we go!

Dirt At The Entrance:

Yours truly was at the venue, Dome at the Accra International Conference before 6pm! Why? The organizers of the awards, Charter house wanted to meet the media early before the commencement of the awards.

For whatever reason, I don’t know. Well, under normal circumstance you wouldn’t get someone like me to be at a venue at 6pm for a show to start at almost 10pm, what’s the logic in that anyway? So they [organizers] managed to have virtually all of us there before 6.

Though the agenda for the meeting was not disclosed to some of us, we got there early enough only to be told, the meeting won’t come on. “Ouch! What the hell” I screamed.

Okay! After queuing up to have my ticket checked to enter the auditorium, I noticed something at the entrance! The place was very dirty; I mean final door before one enters the auditorium.

The security man and a guy who was there to tear part of your ticket before allowing you to enter stood in the dirt and went about their business. It was an eyesore and very unbelievable.

Very interesting but the VIP [people who bought GHC150 priced ticket and invited and nominated artistes] entrance was exactly the opposite of the main entrance, where the regular [people with GHC75 priced ticket] ticket holders passed.

Even when I pinch a colleague to draw his attention to the dirt, the ticket man heard, looked at me and turned to continue with his job annoyingly asking the people to open the card, so he can have access to the ticket easily. It wasn’t funny at all. That should have been avoided Charterhouse.

Sweeping The Stage While People Were Seated:

Just like the entrance, the stage was disorganized. I don’t know what they were thinking but I don’t see the point in sweeping the stage when some people had already seated.

Couldn’t they have swept the stage before allowing people in? You can’t blame the people for coming in that early when your men at the gate duly opened the door for them, checked their ticket and allowed them to enter. Perhaps, I came in too early when they were putting final touches and still testing some of the equipment.

I sat on the front seat on the right side of the stage and I saw everything. The dust from the sweeping messed the atmosphere; It was very bad. Perhaps they didn’t care enough, after all the direction of the dust was at the VIP section, when none of them had shown up.

The dust just smiled at the empty seats. This was something they should have avoided too. Next time, don’t allow the people to start trickling in when you have not finished testing your equipment or swept the stage. It was more annoying, when they started testing the lights even when people had seated. This anomaly was avoidable!

Poor Entrance By Teddy Osei (Osibisa):

Teddy Osei’s entrance to the stage was poor. This mistake was also avoidable! If someone [Osibisa] is billed to perform, the person needs to be at the backstage and not still be seated in the audience and only rushed to the backstage when he is called upon as the next performer.

Teddy Osei, a member of the Osibisa group was announced by the MC KKD to open the show alongside Sherifa Gunu, Bertha and Efya. It was after his name was announced that, he was rushed to the backstage in his wheelchair by Charterhouse crew.

It was obvious the old man went through needless hassle. If the three ladies were at the backstage waiting for their names to be mentioned to enable them to come and perform, why was Teddy Osei still sitting in the audience? Didn’t they know the old man is in wheelchair? I thought, this was avoidable also.

Nothing Shown The Event Was About Ghana!

If Charterhouse wants to copy international awards, they should copy well or they should stick to whatever they can do. Somebody whispered in my ears asking me “What shows that, the event is about Ghana?”

Nothing! Obviously, nothing shown that the event has something to do with Ghana based on the colours and designs at the background. I hurriedly concurred, I’m not saying the venue should have been designed with only Ghana colours, no!

But at least I believe patrons needed to know that, this is Ghana Music Awards. All what the patrons saw at the main entrance to the auditorium suggests something like MTN Music Awards instead of MTN Ghana Music Awards.

I love MTN for one thing; branding! They are good at branding. I’m not talking about previous awards; I’m talking about 2011 edition. I like the set and the designs but using Ghanaian colours instead of the black and white colours or in addition would have been great. Yep, I think so.

Funny Face:

This man with a serious face calls himself Funny Face. He has lots of aliases that most people will not readily remember but when he came to present an award with Mzbel, the audience went crazy as he ‘does’ his things on stage and runs through his aliases.

For an event which was so boring, I think it would have taken a different directions if Funny Face was the MC. Unfortunately, he only presented an award. Comparing KKD and Funny Face on who is the best presenter would be like forcing a square peg into a round hole, it won’t fit. Funny Face is at his peak, so it’s better for Charterhouse to make good use of him before he gets the tag as a ‘veteran’.

Cee’s Hallelujah Video Music:

I didn’t hide my strong liking for Cee’s Hallelujah track featuring Isaac and Ampong. I love that track and I rooted for it and even predicted it to win at least one award; the Gospel Song of the Year but she lost to Afunumu Ba by Cecilia Marfo.

It became obvious when the video of the nominees for the Gospel Song of the Year was played on the large screen that Cee is the only artiste in the category who doesn’t have music video for her track as different video was showed in place of her nominated track. Haven’t we gone pass that stage?

I thought this was an anomaly which was also avoidable. Come on, she can’t be blamed for not having video for that track [I’m not too sure if she doesn’t have a video for the track]. Even if she doesn’t have, why couldn’t the organizers put a picture of her on the screen and play that track?

I know she wasn’t the favourite to win that award but that would have given the awards some swag. I thought it was an oversight but then the same thing was repeated in the Best Collaboration of the Year category, I realized it was intentional.

People Selling Pure Water In The Auditorium:

The mayor of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) is trying hard to get all hawkers out from selling on the streets. But Sir, how about shifting your attention to the Dome, Accra International Conference Centre when it’s time for another Ghana Music Awards? Laugh!

Whiles the musicians kept giving abysmal performances on the awards night, patrons were bombarded with people selling pure [bottled] water and forcing it down on their throat.

I don’t see anything wrong with that but it was just not right. If I wanted pure water, I would have bought it before coming to the venue. I occasionally notice some staff of Charterhouse dragging the sellers out of the auditorium but few minutes later, they were back doing brisk business.

This also could have been avoided. I didn’t see anything at the AMAAs in Nigeria.

Standing On Chairs:

Ghanaians are difficult people but in this instance, you can’t blame them. I don’t think people think they are sexy when they stand on the chairs dancing. The GMA is over subscribed. This doesn’t mean 3,000 tickets should be printed for a 2,000 auditorium.

People paid huge sums of money to watch the GMA, most people watched on TV at home, so the few who had made their way to the venue deserved some level of respect and protection.

The place was full to capacity yet people were still allowed in – these people occupied the walkway made for people to walk freely. Some hijacked and stood just near the stage, making it difficult for people seated to catch a clear glimpse of what was happening on stage.

Seated audiences were compelled to stand on their seats to have a clear view on the stage. So standing on the seat here is justifiable. If there was any security personnel to make sure people did not hijack the stage to prevent people seated from having a clear view, I don’t think people would have been forced to stand on the seat.

Performances On The Night

Comparing to last year’s edition, performances wasn’t that impressive. Only few lived up to the expectation. Me thinks the opening performance where Sherifa Gunu, Bertha and Efya performed a rendition of some songs from Osibisa with assistance Teddy Osei was arguably the best performance on the night. Individually Efya was on point as usual, very creative and confident on the microphone.

Gospel musician Cecilia Marfo was awful. Truth be told, she was a real joke. She put up a ‘concert’ performance running from one end of the stage to the other as if she was training perhaps for the Black Queens team.

She was a complete turn off for many people who liked her track ‘Afunumu Ba’. Performances such as hers can never win her the ‘Artiste of the Year’. But on the flipside, No Tribe saved the gospel musicians, they rocked the stage. They made the so called bad girls with skimpy clothes dance joyously.

Kwabena Kwabena was boring, whiles Okyeame Kwame didn’t tickle my fantasy. Perhaps, the sound can be blamed. Trigmatic also didn’t move me at all. And what exactly did the Stars of the Future contestants do on the stage? Oopss!

Legendary C.K. Mann brought so many smiles on the faces of the younger folks. I won’t say a lot about Ice Prince [Oleku man] because he was not billed to perform, he just came to assist D-Black to do the remix of Oleku. I thought he would have performed his [song] first then climax it with the remix with D-Black.

Generally performances were not up to standard, most of the artistes are not used to performing with live band. They are just good with miming. Next year, should the organizers want to tow the same line, they will have to make sure artiste rehearse vigorously with the band to avoid another bad performance.

Awards Not A Concert:

The show was dragged needlessly. There is a great difference between a concert and an awards show. Artistes should be given time to perform, you can’t just ask them to do what they like, especially when the sound was not that good.

People who couldn’t wait left when some of the most important awards have not been declared. The show started late; 9:40pm and dragged needlessly to the wee hours of Sunday.

This also could have been avoidable. CK Mann was brief but his performance will be talked about till next year. One does not need to perform about 4 songs before; you are hailed as the best on the night.

Presentation:

I know the show was run with a script, so why all these avoidable mistakes? There were instances where KKD got names of next performers wrong. His performance on the night is not something I will call the ‘finest’. It could have been better.

I don’t want to join the choruses people are singing that; the venue was too small for such a show. This is just a plain lie, its spacious enough. If its 2,000 seater auditorium, print 2,000 and not 3,000 tickets.

Security was also poor, though I didn’t see anybody being slapped like last year but then if the security was tight, no body would have come to sell pure water, people would not have been able to hijack the stage to push people to stand on the chairs.

Above are my observations at the awards, I’m ready to read yours too if you were there or even watched it on TV. Congrats to Charterhouse regardless of the anomalies. I had fun and looking forward for 2012. For now, adieus!

By Ebenezer Anangfio Jnr./GhanaCelebrities.Com/Ghana

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