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Ghana's Highlife Music: A Digital Repertoire of Recordings and Pop Art at the Gramophone Records Museum

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 May 2014

Kwame Sarpong
Kwame Sarpong*
Affiliation:
Gramophone Records Museum and Research Centre Cape Coast
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Extract

Throughout history, libraries and archives have been the guardians of the documentary heritage of mankind. Given the rapid evolution of the new technologies, safeguarding the cultural heritage becomes more and more the concern of specialists. One of the essential goals of archival and library services is to facilitate access to the documents or materials in their care, thus ensuring that that cultural heritage is kept alive and can be an object of research and enrichment. Their other important mission is to preserve the materials in their care so that cultural heritage may be passed on intact to future generations, since the future of a nation, a people, or a community is unthinkable without knowledge of its past. Preservation and access to the collection are the main objectives of the digitization project that was implemented recently in our museum with the help of international organizations and collaborators.

One of the main goals of the Gramophone Records Museum and Research Centre of Ghana (GRMRC) is the preservation and the promotion of the nation's musical patrimony. The museum is located in Cape Coast. It is presently situated inside the building of the Centre for National Culture (CNC) just opposite the main gate of the University of Cape Coast. The museum was founded by Kwame Sarpong on the basis of his private collection, spanning over 40 years of music. From the modest beginnings in one small room inside the CNC building, it has grown to occupy an exhibition room, the archives and documentation rooms, and an office.

Type
Research Article
Information
History in Africa , Volume 31 , 2004 , pp. 455 - 461
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 2004

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References

1 Varlamoff, Marie-Thérèse, ed., Safeguarding Our Documentary Heritage, CD-ROM prepared on behalf of UNESCO by the IFLA-PAC (Paris 2000), online at http://web-world.unesco.org/safeguarding/en/Google Scholar.

2 These are Carmelle Begin of the Canadian Museum of Civilization; Dominique Fontaine of the Daniel Langlois Foundation for the Art, Science and Technology; Gilles St. Laurent of Library and Archives Canada; and Kwodwo Opoku-Agyemang of the Office of International Programs, University of Cape Coast.

3 Sackey, Chrys Kwesi, Highlife: Entwicklung und Stilfomen ghanaischer Gegenwartsmusik (Münster, 1995), 445–55Google Scholar.

4 Harris, Kenneth E. and Schur, Susan, Caring for America's Library: a Brief History of Preservation and Conservation at the Library of Congress (Washington, 2000)Google Scholar; Pickett, A.G. and Lemco, M.M., Preservation and Storage of Sound Recordings (Washington, 1959)Google Scholar.

5 See www.fondation-langlois.org.

6 See www.loc.gov/folklife/.

7 Clayton, Trevor, “Restoring Ghana's Highlife,” NLC Bulletin 35/4(2003), www.nlc-bnc.ca/bulletin/p2-0403-06-e.htmlGoogle Scholar. For the National Library of Canada's Virtual Gramophone see www2.nlc-bnc.ca/gramophone/.

8 Record-cleaning machine, type HW-17F, VPI Industries Inc., USA.

9 The equipment used consists of a belt-driven turntable with continuously variable speed (Esoteric Sound Inc., USA), chronological equalizer (K.A.B. Electro Acoustics, USA), an external audio interface (Dua 11, Merging Technologies, Switzerland), an internal audio processing board (Mykerinos, Merging Technologies, Switzerland), and a denoising and despatching software (Pyramix Virtual Studio, Merging Technologies, Switzerland).

10 The camera used is a Canon Powershot G2.

11 The DAT-recorder used is a TCDD8, Sony Corporation, Japan.

12 The five musicians interviewed are Oscarmore Ofori (1950s composer, guitarist, and cultural affairs instructor at the National Commission on Culture); El Grand Koffie (1960s bandleader, composer, guitarist); Ebow Taylor (1960s bandleader, guitarist, composer); C.K Mann (1960s/1970s bandleader, vocalist, guitarist, composer); and Pat Thomas (1970s bandleader, vocalist).

13 P.N.D.C Law 110 of 1985, revised 2003.