About Us
Akoo Show Choir is dedicated to the traditions and the beauty of Ghanaian music, dance and percussion. At the same time, this fantastic and unique group is eager to network inside and outside of Africa. Today the Akoos present songs and dances from many African countries. They created a unique style of traditional and newly interpreted African Gospels, Spirituals and Traditionals.
Find out everything about the history of our choir and our members.
Our Story
Mr. Francis Baffoe, an adept musician, who was then a member of the famous Winneba Youth Choir, founded the mellifluous and dynamic group of young talented musicians in 2012, known as the Akoo Show Choir. His vision was to start a choir, which would perform extraordinarily from regular choirs in Ghana and other countries. He started with six strong and positive minded friends who have been singing with him on many platforms and other corporate programs since childhood. They immediately started rehearsing many Gospel repertoires from Ghana and other African countries, which, within only a few months, exposed them to perform at various programs within the vicinity of Winneba and other surrounding towns and now, the whole of Ghana. Francis later received the opportunity of working with some choirs in Germany for many years. Upon his return, one of the choirs he worked with, Moko Choir from Heidelberg, decided to perform with Francis’ choir through musical concerts. It was during one of these concerts at the Ebenezer Methodist Cathedral, Winneba that the Akoo Show Choir was officially outdoored.
In their native language, ‘Akoo’ means parrot and like a parrot, they are able to mimic unique warbles, sounds, buzzes and tunes with their spectacular voices. They conspicuously sing to attract attention from far and near and just like singing birds in many species, where only male birds sing, Akoo Show Choir is also an all-male singing group. They are also distinctive in cultural performances such as dancing, acting and drumming from the rich, beautiful and various Ghanaian cultures and cultures in other African countries.
In the years 2013 and 2014, the choir gained international experience on concert tours in Germany. During one of these tours, together with the Lesedi Show Choir from South Africa, they performed a six-week project dubbed „Umoya Munye“, meaning ONE SPIRIT. This project offered both choirs the opportunity to learn from each other’s culture as well as perform with other choirs in Germany.
Akoo Show Choir in 2014 won the premiere edition of a nationwide musical competition “Celebrations”, organized by a popular television station (TV 3) in Ghana. As the years went by, the choir also increased in number, with the current total members of more than 20 gentlemen who can all sing, dance and play an instrument making them unique.
„It is our vision to travel all over the world and show people the richness of our Ghanaian culture and of other African nations“
Listen to our song
„Our Father“
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Akoo Show Choir and their Adinkra symbols
Adinkra is the name of the symbolic language used in Ghana. The language is traditionally used in all areas of life, on clothing, on house walls, pottery and wooden goods. Today, more and more Adinkra symbols are being used as logos by companies. This symbolic language originated in Ghana, in the Ashanti ethnic group, in the Ashanti region.
There are indications of an origin of the Adinkra in the early 19th century. The legend says that at the time the Ashanti had waged war against the Gyaman (today´s area of Ivory Coast). The Ashanti emerged victorious from this war and even took with them the king´s son as their prisoner. He offered the Ashanti in exchange for his life to teach the art of Adinkra. Since then, the Adinkra Center in Ghana is the village of Asokwa located south of Kumasi in the Ashanti region.
Symbolism
Each Adinkra symbol represents a word from the Ashanti language, a sentence, a historically significant event, a proverb or animals or plants. The word Adinkra is often translated as „goodbye“, which probably indicates the use of Adinkra in the context of funerals.
The meaning
Probably the most famous Adinkra symbol – Gye Nyame (God alone) – stands for the omnipotence of God. The circle portrays the presence of God, rectangles stand for masculinity and holiness and the triangle stands for femininity or desire.
The Akoo Show Choir has taken on the task to convey this symbolic language, which is part of Ghana´s history. They have musically processed this special language for all the people in the world. With their own composed songs and traditional songs the Akoo Show Choir explains this language to the people. They talk about African and especially Ghanaian history. They introduce and explain their lives, their religion and their faith and convey this with music. They explain all these symbols that their ancestors have designed and developed. Today you will see these symbols everywhere, on clothes, pottery, musical instruments, even as tattoos and as a signature of companies.
Akoo itself means parrot in the Ghanaian Akan language. Like parrots with their colours and power to mimic every sound, the members of the choir showcase their unique charisma in their performances with their facial expressions and the sounds of their songs.
NGO
„Long time ago I was thinking about several situations in my life and how the people there feel when it´s christmas. I realized that it`s so painful to see kids in the hospital with their parents and I also imagine the people at the orphanage who doesn´t know their parents or where their from. These things really breaks my heart.
Some times later, I got the chance to talk to some prisoners. I asked them why they were arrested. I heard really touching stories“. (Francis Baffoe)
These experiences were the cause of that, why Francis decided to visit these places with his boys, the Akoo Show Choir, to sing for them, to encourage them and „to give them the positive feeling that we are thinking of them and also to make them feel important“.
„But in all, I always tell myself and my boys that it´s a privilege that none of us is in such a situation. So we have to be grateful and to appreciate all the good things in our lives, like „Music“!“. (Francis Baffoe)
Since that time the choir applied for and got
Today and every year these three topics are the contents of the choir´s projects.