In the musical landscape of Africa, Ghana has secured a plot for its outstanding music, be it Gospel, Highlife, Reggae or Afrobeats.
These ‘new school’ and ‘old School’ artists are breaking barriers and lifting the flag of Ghana high with their hard work and talents.
In line with this, Ghanaweekend.com has identified six(6) Ghanaian musicians who did tremendously well both locally and internationally in 2022. These are artists whose talents and songs touched the hearts of many across the globe.
The list is compiled based on factors like the number of hit songs, international fame, domestic impact, and pop influence.
Below is the list of the artists who did tremendously well both locally and internationally.
1.BLACK SHERIF
Born and raised in Konongo in the Ashanti Region of Ghana, Black Sheriff is one of the newest Ghanaian artists making waves globally with his hit songs. His song “Kweku The Traveller” is currently popular all over the world.
With 1.3 million followers, Black Sheriff is one of the most streamed Ghanaian rappers on all the streaming platforms. His music is a blend of Ghanaian Highlife with reggae, hip hop, and other genres. Many of his songs are very popular and trendy online with a great number of streams on streaming platforms.
He has even gained the attention of top musicians globally, the most recent being DJ Khaled, who described Black Sherif’s songs as ‘music that touches your soul’.
The award-winning recording act and entertainer on Thursday, October 6, 2022, published the anticipated studio work titled, “The Villian I Never Was.”
The album has since received different reviews with the majority calling it a “masterpiece.”
‘The Villain I Never Was’ features his monster hit tunes, ‘Kwaku The Traveller’ and ‘Second Sermon Remix’.
Black Sherif is having a good run with the project as 13 songs from the 14-tracked album occupy a spot (1-13) on Apple Music Top 100 Charts Ghana. Only ‘Second Sermon Remix’ was missing from the chart.
2. KIDI
Dennis Nana Dwamena, better known as KiDi, is a Ghanaian high-life and afrobeats singer-songwriter.
He is signed to Lynx Entertainment and is best known for his global hit single Touch It. The remix features American rapper Tyga and has received massive streaming across the world .He won his first-ever Artiste of the Year Award.
He beat stiff competition from Black Sherif, King Promise, Kuami Eugene, Sarkodie and Joe Mettle to emerge winner.
KiDi also swept away some of the biggest awards on the night especially with his hit song ‘Touch It’.He was also crowned as the Artiste Of The Year’ at this year’s 3Music Awards.
Together with Kuami Eugene, the ‘Touch It’ hitmaker brought excitement to music fans when they staged a live musical concert at the O2 Arena in London to commemorate Ghana’s 65th Independence Day celebration.
The well-attended concert witnessed energetic live performances from Kuami Eugene and KiDi, who performed their various hit songs, without breaks, to entertain fans.
The turnout for the event was impressive, given that it was their first shot in London at the Indigo O2.
The two Lynx Entertainment acts managed to fill the 5,000 capacity auditorium with fans and gave a great performance.It
KiDi on the 17th of December, 2022 released the second remix of his “Touch” It Remix which featured Indian singer Tulsi Kumar and the official video accumulated over 7 million views in a day
He is the first to achieve such a feat
3. CAMIDOH
One Ghanaian artist who really made huge waves internationally is Raphael Camidoh Kofi Attachie.
The 21-year-old talented Ghanaian Afropop, R&B, and Afrobeats songwriter and musician known by the stage name Camidoh, mesmerized the music world with his monster hit song ‘Sugarcane,
‘Sugarcane’, a favourite of many music fans, brought him to the limelight after trending in 8 nations on the Spotify ecosystem, including France and Norway.
With lyrics that jump between English and Ewe, he is the shining example of Ghana’s emerging Afropop movement.
Camido’s music journey started in late 2018 with his debut track, ‘For My Lover,’ which featured Darko Vibes.
4.WENDY SHAY
With stunningly-stunning hit songs like ‘Survivor’ Habiba and Heat, there is no way an artist like Wendy Shay’s name was going to be excluded from such a list.
The celebrated Afropop and Afrobeats singer. Known in real life as Wendy Asiamah Addo, Wendy Shay, was named the 2022 most-streamed female artiste in Ghana on Boomplay.This declaration was based on the Boomplay Global Stats from November 2021 to October 2022.
The Rufftown Records signee was the only female Ghanaian artiste who featured on Boomplay’s top 10 out of their weekly 100 songs during the release of Boomplay’s mid-year streaming statistics.
5. STONEBWOY
In the year under review, Stonebwoy has won many awards but what made omitting his name from this list impossible is his performance at the FIFA World Cup in Doha, Qatar, ahead of the final match between France and Argentina.
No stranger to representing Africa on the world stage and as a beacon of unity, uniting Africa to the world through music, Stonebwoy’s inclusion in the 22nd edition of the FIFA World Cup makes him one of the artistes of the Year.
The Award-winning reggae and dancehall artiste has been announced as one of the artistes billed to rock the biggest end-of-year party exclusively organised by Citi TV/Citi FM, dubbed “The Citiuation“, on December 24, 2022.
6.JOSEPH MATTHEW
Another Ghanaian artiste whose name can never be excluded from the list is UK-based Afro gospel singer . Joseph Matthew.
He is in the list for being the current best abroad-based Ghanaian Gospel musician. Known for hit songs such as ‘ Blessed’, ‘Nyame Ye’ and ‘Not Alone’ , Joseph Matthew’s type of Christian music expresses everything about the gospel of Christ like any other gospel song, but it has got rap and pop culture added to it.
He took this year by storm with his hit single song “Blessed” . The song really enjoyed massive airplay and also created a huge controversy.
The song reminds Christians, no matter the challenges we may go through, our victory is assured and also there is power in the name of God.
The well-produced song has been tipped to win Record of the Year at the 2023 Vodafone Ghana Music Awards (VGMA)
By Reagan Mends