Emmanuel Gyimah Labi

About

Emmanuel Gyimah Labi is a Ghanaian composer, conductor, and music professor. He is a graduate of the Achimota School and a former conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra Ghana.

In 1971, Labi became a member of the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation Orchestra, where he played cello and was also involved in composition. He was a member of the orchestra for six years. During this time, he also studied for a bachelor's degree in music and philosophy at the University of Ghana, graduating in 1976. His tutors included Ato Turkson and Joseph Hanson Kwabena Nketia. After graduation, Labi undertook further musicological study at the University of Illinois and the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. In 1984, he began lecturing at the University of Nigeria and, later, at Mercy College in New York and the University of Ghana. Between 1988 and 1997, Labi was the director of the National Symphony Orchestra Ghana.

As a composer, his music incorporates indigenous musical practices. His music is characterized by cross-rhythms, agogic stresses and quartal and extended tertial harmonies. He sometimes uses tonal and rhythmic patterns to highlight the musical practices of a particular people, such as the Anlo-Ewe.

Related Information

Works by Emmanuel Gyimah Labi