Musical Exploits Of Gyedu Blay Ambolley

Our music industry has passed through a transitional period of stages under critical comparative observation.

Between the 1960 and 1970s commonly referred to as the golden years of our modern formative years of our industry, some musicians hitherto not being heard in big time show biz have managed through the mill to hit the road to stardom with glittering achievement.

One of them is Gyedu Blay Ambolley. Raised and schooled in Sekondi in the Western Region, he fell in love with music very early when he was only a knee high and so after his college education, e seriously studied the rudiments of music under the tutelage of Sammy Lartey and grew in skills of guitar playing under Uncle Bonku in Sekondi.

Later, he found himself playing for the Ghana Railways Dance Band under De Roy Ebo Taylor, a veteran master guitarist until he dreamt of Houghas Extraordinaire International having come his way which made banner headlines in those days, when he played the bass guitar shortly after he had briefly nestled in Tricky Johnson Sextelle as a vocalist.

In 1970, he found himself as a vocalist with Ghana Broadcasting Corporation band, and later crossed over to Uhuru Dance Band highly noted in those days for its galaxy of creamy stars and again under the leadership of De Roy Ebo Taylor tirelessly recorded his debut single 'Simigwa do" in 1973 which was not only a huge hit but also a commercial break through.

After a musical flirtation with Apegya Show Band he irresistibly obliged to play indigenous, authentic and original music in 1974 and the group to do another recording. In 1976, he felt gradually climbing the ladder of success when he joined the Super Food Complex band in Tema, where he recorded his first long playing album called "Ambolley."

As if it was a march from here to eternity in 1974, Lady Luck smiled on him to form his own band called Zanfoda Mark III and again was chanced to tour Europe including the U.K. before returning to Ghana to form another band called the Stene Boots and recorded 'Abrantsie me cigarette si manu' in 1986 literally meaning "I am a young man with cigarette lit on my lips." With insatiable thirst seeking more laurels, he went to the United States where again recorded a few jazz albums.

These collection of jazz stuff are currently given a stupendous air play across the states in the U. S. where he has prominently been sharing the stage with American Jazz greats like Herbie Hancock, Art Farmer, Joe Williams, Elvin Jones just to mention few. His passion for Jazz music had assumed meteoric dimension and consistently been exposed and privileged to play at Jazz festivals in Canada, inside the states and Europe. After a lively, eventful musical career, he has made it with 21 albums to his credit.

By a dint of hard work, Blay Ambolley earlier gave indication of his inventive prowess, earning him an awards galore consisting of a life time achievement award presented to him by Charles R. Drew University in Los Angeles, California, plus congressional honours extended to him which marked the acme of his musical recognition, with the buttress of Governatorial award from the Governor of the State of California for his immense contribution to the entertainment landscape of California State.

Gyedu Blay Ambolley still bitten by the bug of insatiable thirst is seeing the sky as his only limit and intends to come out with his latest album slated for April, this Saturday, just few days away and intends to put on the bill to feature his two grand children aged 4 and 6.

Asked what he has for the musical youth or the younger generation, he smiled and said. "It is very expedient at this time of our cultural development to seriously encourage these youngsters to learn the rudiments of music. This I believe will help facilitate appropriately the composition of any musical stuff they might come up with," he noted.

To a question, he said he plans to produce up and coming talented artists from Sekondi in his studios at Sekondi.

Although Ghana has come a long way of her 50th anniversary jubilee of independence, the need to improve is beckoning authorities, who are at the helm of affairs to stop looking at music ordinarily as a form of entertainment and urged the government to invest in the music industry, seeing that it is a gold mine. He briefly referred to the exploits of the famous British pop group 'The Beatles' who he said earned fame and brought wealth to Britain from abroad.

At the Independence Square, during the 50th Jubilee Independence celebration, Gyedu Ambolley shared the stage with American stars, the Whispers and Heward Hewitt of Shalamar.

Source: Charles Amuah