Daddy Lumba (Charles Kwadwo Fosu; 29 September 1964 – 26 July 2025) was a Ghanaian singer-songwriter whose 30-plus albums forged a blueprint for contemporary Ghanaian music. He is widely held as the nation’s most enduring and influential musical figure.

Following his death in Accra, Ghana, aged 60, grief continues to ripple throughout a nation known to merge sorrow with celebration - a reflection Ghana’s singularly dual relationship to death, where funerals - often seen as the supreme social gesture through which "a life well lived" is affirmed - function as both vigil and myth made manifest. Emma Korantema presents this sonic essay as tribute to a musician whose final departure is as yet awaited by a nation of mourners (at the time of recording, Daddy Lumba’s funeral has yet to take place), and as a return to the metaphysical explorations of her first Oroko radio show, named after Lumba's song, ANKWANOMA (sic, 2022-2024).

Besides love’s enduring melody and the Akan heartbeat, Lumba’s music boasted lyricism covering the themes of migration, politics, philosophy faith, and survival. His gift lay in professing the weight of personal evolution, through the creation of over 200 genre-bending records (technological artefacts) as anchors to time and place.

A pioneer of the Borga (Burger) Highlife genre, Lumba and his contemporaries captured beautifully the deeply emotional experiences, societal impacts and sonic influences of a Ghanaian diaspora generation, particularly those living in Europe throughout the 1990s and years following. His contribution to music and to the architecture of Ghana’s sonic identity remains prescient, precise, and perennial.

Featuring the songs: Children of the Future, Ankwanoma, Sika Asem, Dangerous, Abena Wo Aha, Akoma Da Akoma So, Ma To Odo Mu, Bla Bla Bla, Poison, Adaka Tea, Makra Mo, as well as music from two of Lumba’s closest collaborators: Nana Acheampong and Paulina Oduro.

Total running time: 60 minutes