I always remember my senior high (secondary school as it was known then) entertainment nights with much nostalgia, for a wide range of reasons. For a school such as Pope John Senior High which is no doubt among the best schools for entertainers. I always looked forward to entertainment, because apart from the show there was always a new story to be told that night.
It was during our early entertainment nights in the first year, in 2004, that I first heard and came across the Azonto Dance. In those days, there were two major dances on campus; Azonto and floor works. Students who could do any of these dances to perfection was always the toast of the night. Personally, I always preferred Azonto to floor-works because unlike floor-works, which was highly skilled and complicated, Azonto looked simpler and fun to dance along. During my secondary schooling years (between 2004 and 2007) Azonto was confined to mostly secondary schools, little did we know that this dance will in a few years, take a national as well as international dimension as it has today.
Azonto today, no doubt is the king of the Ghanaian stage performance. From toddlers to the elderly in society, the Azonto dance fever seems to have gripped the whole country with everyone trying hard to Azonto to any musical tune they hear. Though the Azonto dance today is quite different from what we danced backed in secondary school, it is still the fun dance moves of Azonto that endears it to the masses. In the wake of this fever that shot to a crescendo in 2011, I asked a friend in one of our many discussions whether this Azonto dance had not found itself on the popular online encyclopedia Wikipedia. To my surprise he responded in the affirmative. Wow! was the expression on my face when I looked up the write-up on Wikipedia. The following is a summary of what is found.
Azonto is an original Ghanaian expressive dance and music form. Azonto dance form fashion in very few one-two timed steps. Just like most African dances, knee bending and hip movements are rudiments to dancing it. The dance has effectively evolved from a few rudimentary moves to embrace depictions of ironing, washing, driving, boxing, grooming and others. Generally, the dance reflects the creativity and rich sense of humor of the Ghanaian people. The dance which is usually performed with an accompanying smile evolved from a few rudimentary moves to embrace depictions of ironing, washing, driving, boxing etc. The dance evolved from the combination of several local dance moves that originated from the southern-most part of Ghana during the early 2000s. The dance has evolved with the fast pace dance culture of modern West Africa. It is also true that before the dance became famous, youth in senior high schools of Ghana had a similar but different way of doing the dance. A modification of that is what we see today.
Never in my short life in Ghana have I seen a dance so popular to an extent that the nation has rallied behind and is proud of. It’s good for the nation as well as our identity as Ghanaians. As a nation, it will be important to know what value we will be placing on this. Are we treating it as another dance that will soon die down and pass like many before it, or could this offer us another opportunity to add to our numerous dances that we can potentially market as our culture and heritage? In my opinion, I think Ghanaians should not just see this as another dance passing through but rather an opportunity to sell something unique to the outside world.
If Ghanaians can, in their own country, create salsa dance clubs and yearly hold salsa festivals and competitions, then I don’t see why we can’t do the same for a dance that has originated right in our country and sell it out of here just like salsa has been imported into this country and people are willing to pay big monies just to be taught to dance it and it is done with so much pride.
Current trends are pointing to this but it is not done in any coordinated manner. We are all too excited dancing Azonto with the least opportunity we get. Apart from this excitement, we should realize that we have been presented as a nation an opportunity. It might seem insignificant but the entertainment and tourism industry are multi-million industries.
As to whether Azonto has come to stay we can only wait and see but that certainly will depend on players in the industry as well the generality of Ghanaians as a whole.