Ghanaian musician and radio personality, Kwame OB Nartey has posited that it is wrong for a gospel artist to feature a secular musician on their song.
O.B Nartey made this known during an interview on a radio station based in Accra.
This follows after Celestine Donkor had revealed that some Christian based television station, refused to air her newly released single ‘Thank you’ because she featured, Akwaboah and Efya who are both secular musicians. O.B Nartey had earlier expressed on air during his program at Vision One, that the collaboration of the secular musicians on Celestine’s song, was a needless one.
Explaining why it was not right for gospel musicians to feature secular musicians, O.B Nartey expressed that, already, the gospel music terrain is fighting for a space in the music industry that has been highly dominated by secular music, therefore including secular musicians into gospel songs will give way for them [secular musicians] to infiltrate the little space that they [gospel musicians] have and so that little space must at all cost be protected.
“The whole media fraternity, everybody pays attention to secular music more than any another music. In the past years when radio presenters are about to begin their programs, they tend to play gospel songs first, now it is no more…so it means we are in a major minority, we are lacking in the audience, we are lacking in followership and so we need space for our[gospel music]kind of music we do. If we don’t protect it then we have given way for some sort of friendly infiltration and before you realize, we have lost it all…it must be kept and kept sacred”.
He went further to emphasize that, featuring the secular artist on a piece of gospel music puts the genre in a relegated state as everyone’s attention is drawn to the secular artists that are featured on the song when the main focus should be the gospel being propagated.
“It is a subconscious agenda…this puts us in a more relegated space, that anytime a gospel artist has a collaboration with a gospel artist, all the attention goes to the secular artist, why? Because they have the majority of people who patronize their music more than the gospel artist”.
O.B also debated that, the claims made by artists saying that ‘gospel music is for all’ is a wrong assertion since being a gospel artist means you have to follow certain guidelines and doctrines.
“When it comes to gospel music and sacred music, there are rules. There are guidelines, regulations, and systems you have to obey. Gospel is not just opened for anyone to come and do what they want. You are either here [gospel musician] or there [secular musician]”.
Touching on the issue of Celestine’s new single, OB Nartey declined making the statement that, Celestine’s collaboration with the secular artists was a needless one on air. He revealed that he only spoke to Celestine’s husband, who is also her manager and told him that “if she had done the song alone, it would have made a similar impact”.
Read also: GOSPEL MUSICIANS ARE NOT UNITED LIKE THEY MAKE IT SEEM – AKWABOAH
