The Next Big Thing in Ghana

 By Chris Twum
The Next Big Thing, Ghana's first hip hop reality show, which is shown on GH-One TV on Sunday at 6PM, saw the emcees performing their first task.

The 12 contestants, with the stage names; Bebelino, E.D.N.A (the only female emcee) Tee-flow, Mr. Illygal, Leetee, Magnificent, Nate-pro, Strongman, Jojo, King Kosovo, Selorm and Back are set to take the competition to the next level.

The contestants in the first week met Scientific and Mensa of Fokn bois fame, who interacted with them on the business side of the hip-hop industry. They also had some lessons on free-styling. After all the pampering they received from this meeting, the contestants are faced with their first performance session.

The emcees sang songs from their hip hop icons all over the world. On the night of the performance they performed songs by hip hop legends like Kanye West, Coolio, 50cent, Cassidy, Tiger, Drake, Fabulous, Maino, Eminem and MI.

Although no one chose any GH hip hop artistes, it was a night of fun as the emcees took turns to perform with the aim of outperforming the other emcee in hopes of winning the hearts of the judges and the public.

Judges for the night was the rap doctor Okyeame Kwame and the first lady Eazzy, who expected exciting performances from the emcees. The overall performance was good and most of the emcees had the right attitude to the songs they chose, good diction and articulation, good usage of the stage and some dance moves that thrilled the audience.

Magnificent and E.D.N.A had received positive feedback from the audience. Some emcees included the audience in their performance making them not feel left out while others added a touch of their own freestyle into the songs trying to make it their own.

Some emcees forgot the lyrics to the songs, which were attributed to nervousness because they had been taken out of their comfort zone and were expected to give a performance that would not be just like their icons.