As part of the inaugural Creative Enterprise Support Programme (CESP), the British Council in Accra has awarded emerging Ghanaian musicians and creative entrepreneurs subsidies to support their career and chosen projects.
The grants was presented to a selected ten emerging musicians from Ghana who were taken through an intensive two-week boot camp – where they received mentoring from industry experts including producer Juls, Spotify manager for Anglophone West Africa Benewaah Boateng, Boomplay Ghana manager Elizabeth Ntiamoah and musician Mensa, among others.
The ‘NextGen 22‘ grantees, chosen from a pool of 30 applicants, include Edwin Quartey, Brakutz, Sosawavegod, Toyboi, Atswei Franalo, Daddo Gyan, Elodie Dee, Yung Tuff, Pure Akan, and Essilfie, who described the grant as a “big win,” according to Music in Africa. “I’d like to thank Culture Forward for being a part of my journey,” Elodie Dee said.
“I am so proud of our top 10 finalists, and this is a very essential programme that needed to happen,” rapper M.anifest, who co-founded Culture Forward, said. ”We have an ecosystem in which a lot of creative people and music professionals don‘t get a lot of resources to help them learn and level up. This is a necessary programme, and I‘m so proud of the work that we‘ve put together these past couple of months.”
Launched in December 2021, CESP was created by the British Council in partnership with Culture Forward (Ghana), the University of the Arts London, and Impact Hub Accra, and aims to enable mechanisms for economic or financial empowerment for the rapidly growing creative economy professionals. It also intends to “stimulate links between the UK and Ghanaian music creative economy by delivering training, mentoring, networking and business development services for young, emerging music professionals in Ghana in partnership with their peers in the UK.”
The initiative targeted music entrepreneurs including performing artists, songwriters, producers, DJs, sound engineers, music video producers, marketers, promoters, managers, agents, A&R representatives and tech professionals.