The fourth edition of the Ghana DJ Awards organized by Mercury Republik came off yesterday at the Accra International Conference Centre. Prior to the show, there was huge publicity on social media, radio and print media and it was worth it.
On the final day the decision by Hitz 103.9FM to transmit their late afternoon shows ‘Cruise Control’ and ‘Hitz Gallery’ live from the auditorium really helped. The hype was really amazing.
Let me quickly run you through some of the activities that unfolded within the four walls of the Accra International Conference Centre.
STAGE
The stage and arrangements were okay but as a national event, I was expecting the DJ’s Booth which is actually the main point of contact to be branded.
SOUND
Sound settings of microphone were quite good. I had a brief chat with one sound engineer who was present throughout the show and he also attested to the fact that the sound quality was better as compared to the previous years.
LIGHT
Lighting was average – an improvement upon what we experienced in the past.
TIME
Show started at exactly 11:09pm mostly because organizers were still prepping and the audience had also arrived late. There was no red carpet session and to me it underscored the performance of the organizers. The auditorium became full after 12am.
UNFILTERED LIVE TWEETS
There was a projection of live tweets on two screens with the hashtag #GhanaDjAwards16 which gave room to a lot of people to tweet irrelevant stuff. The tweets were not filtered.
HOSTS & OPENING ACTS
Lexis Bills & MzGee were the main host, with KMJ being the announcer.
Their introduction was good but DJ Wabs electrified the auditorium with amazing Djing skills. He was actually one of the best performers of the night. He subsequently won ‘Discovery DJ’ of the year.
AWARD PRESENTATION
Award presentations delayed because video slides were not playing to mention the nominees. Agyeman Prempeh of Rainbow radio who won ‘Best Gospel DJ’ refused to give an acceptance speech because there was no plaque for him.
Most of the award winners were also not present at the programme but according to some of nominees who came, there wasn’t any special arrangement by the organizers to make them attend.
As has been typical of most award schemes in Ghana, most of the winners also went on stage with a lot of people. Their acceptance speeches were glaringly unplanned, boring and bore no substantive messages in them.
LIVE RADIO TRANSMISSION
The show was carried live on HITZ 103.9 FM but worryingly, the songs that were played and preformed were mostly profane.
AWARD PRESENTATION
Best Award presenter of the night was Joy 99.7FM’s Nathaniel Attoh. He didn’t mix them up.
On the other side, most of the award presenters including SP Kofi Sarpong and Samini, were mentioning ‘Best Artiste’ instead of ‘Best DJ’. But Samini actually alluded to the fact that he mostly come on stage to sing for people to enjoy but not talking to present an award and the audience should forgive him.
PERFORMANCES
Let me quickly remind us all that Awards shows are not musical concerts. Even though it is a good platform for people to see their favorite artiste perform, songs should be cut down to a certain number and timed. On the day of the event some of the acts who came to perform were actually trying out the popularity of their songs.
There was no magic moment for me because it was the regular miming and the “DJ play the next song make I spoil there” thingy.
DJ Wabs and Cue showcased their potentials as DJs. DJ Vyrusky and MzVee gave a spectacular performance. Gallaxy had a nice concept but couldn’t work out well because the DJ over pitched their instrumentals throughout. Chameleon, Eno did their best.
Lexis Bill’s untimely introduction of Baba Spirit on stage actually saved and revived the show. He played around relevant and current issues to win the hearts of many who were present. Other performers include Don Itchy, Apaatse and Ras Kuku’s performances was also below standard.
SECURITY
Security at the gate was great but inside the auditorium was another thing. Fans were always seen in front of the stage anytime an artiste was performing. During Ras Kuuku’s performance, a fan actually climbed the stage and dragged his leg but with a quick intervention of his bodyguard there was no casualty.
I don’t want to underrate the hard work of the organizing team of the Award scheme but the low points at this year’s Ghana DJ Awards are not good enough for the brand. If these flaws I pointed out is as a result of the laziness of some people who were paid to work but failed to deliver then they should be sanctioned.
On the other hand the organizers needs sometime to grow and master the act of organizing an event like this one. I hope the team will review their own performance and introduce more strategic plans that will make the award more credible to even attract investors and audience beyond the borders of Ghana.
Source: Jonilar
