Mark Okraku-Mantey, former Deputy Minister for Tourism, Arts and Culture and respected music producer and commentator, has attributed Kuami Eugene’s swift rise in the Ghanaian music industry to his deep-rooted knowledge of highlife.
Speaking as a guest on Joy FM’s highlife music discussion, on Thursday March 5, hosted by Winston Amoah and Kojo Akoto, Okraku-Mantey delved into the genre’s history, its distinctly Ghanaian origins, ongoing preservation efforts, and how it has evolved amid growing influences from Afrobeats and other contemporary sounds.
During the conversation, he singled out Kuami Eugene as a standout example of an artist who took the time to truly immerse himself in classic, old-school highlife.
According to Okraku-Mantey, Eugene’s extensive study and listening of traditional highlife tracks built a solid foundation that allowed him to break into the industry with relative ease. That grounding, he argued, gave Eugene an authentic edge — enabling him to weave highlife elements naturally into his music and earn his reputation as a modern torchbearer of the genre, a status reflected in projects such as his “Highlife Time” concerts and his well-received mashups of classic songs.
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However, Okraku-Mantey did not hide his concern over what he sees as a shift in Eugene’s artistic direction. Since parting ways with Lynx Entertainment around mid-2025, the singer’s output has tilted more toward Afro-fusion, broader Afrobeats influences, and sounds crafted for global appeal — a trajectory that some feel distances him from his highlife roots.
His remarks touched on a wider conversation within the Ghanaian music industry about how artists balance tradition with commercial ambition. Okraku-Mantey was particularly firm on one point: highlife belongs exclusively to Ghana. “Highlife is solely owned by Ghana,” he said, adding that Nigerians cannot lay claim to the genre — a pointed remark amid ongoing debates about the genre’s ownership and identity as it gains international attention.