Lamisi recently rocked the Ghanaian musical scene with her hit single Tanka Fanka. The multilingual musician flaunted her vocals and artistic versatility with her euphoric dance moves and infectious larger-than-life personality in the music video for her first single.
Born Regina Lamisi Awiniman Anabilla Akuka, Lamisi who is a graduate student at the University of Ghana said she started her professional music career, 6 years ago. In an interview with Moses Amegatse on Fiila Fm’s Real Talk segment of the Daybreak Tamale morning show on Friday June 30, 2017, Lamisi said that she has always loved music but didn’t plan to go into music as a career. She revealed “I didn’t plan to go into music, I just had an opportunity. I had a call from Becca one night and I was like I’m out of school had nothing doing and was going to be paid for it so I said, ‘why not.’” Her determination and focus pushed her to pursue a career that she loves dearly.
The Afropop artiste revealed that she’s not limited to Afropop even though her second song is quite traditional. Lamisi shared her hopes of having an impactful lasting career on the arts and entertainment scene in Ghana. She said, “I’m versatile. I can differ a bit but not completely out of African components of music. I don’t want to be the type of artiste who releases a single and then go and later my return would be captioned “come back of…”
Discussing her challenges as a backup singer, she shared her experiences working with various musicians.
According to her, back-up singers were often blamed (behind-the-scenes) when music production did not go the way musicians planned; on the other hand, they were hardly given credit when songs became big hits. Speaking about moving from the shadows into the limelight, Lamisi said that backing vocalists usually need extra motivation to continue their work but she has adopted a more relaxed attitude to life in general as a frontline artiste.
Among artistes that Lamisi enjoyed working with are Samini, Stonebwoy and Rocky Dawuni.
Talking about, Tanka Fanka, the single that officially launched her solo career, Lamisi said that the song was produced by her friend, Adangba.
According to her, she started work on the song 3 years ago. She also said Tanka Fanka is drawn from “Karika Tanka” in Hausa which means, “Forget Everyone and Stay Focused.”
Lamisi believes the Northern Ghanaian music industry is filled with a lot of talent and potential and that with some financial support and a little push on the production side, the industry could be even more vibrant than it is now.
Credits: Aliyya Lukman Abu Grant
