Walking with Asafo in Ghana
An Ethnographic Account of Kormantse Bentsir Warrior Music
The first full-length study of the musical pasts of Asafo warrior associations based on the author's "ways of walking" with local scholars along the Ghanaian littoral.

What is Asafo ndwom (music)? How and when is it performed? What is the state of this warrior tradition that once served as the bedrock of the Akan, Ewe, and Ga societies in Ghana? How does Asafo enact the past and serve as an archive for the people? In an attempt to answer these questions, Walking with Asafo in Ghana investigates the musical pasts of Asafo. The book is an ethnography of walking, organized into eight chapters. Each chapter ends with a piece of creative writing in the author's "ethnographic voice," in which she sums up the main ideas. It is Aduonum's attempt at an anticolonial and decolonialist African musicology, one that subverts and decenters white racial framing of research, analysis, and presentation, disrupting how
Euro-American concepts frame our ways of telling and experiencing ndwom.
Aduonum's goal on this trajectory is to tell her story, create something new, and chart a new path. Through this fluid and complex book, she repositions African Elders' knowledge as "epistemologies of decolonization and
de-coloniality" and centers the stories shared by local Fante scholars.
The text is polyvocal, multimodal, multiperspective, performative, reflexive, and dialogic, informed by the structure of Asafo ndwom, appellations, proverbs, her mentors' tellings, and "embodied" calling and responding. It is a performative scholarly discourse, ndwom-based: a performance. As a celebration of Asafo, those warriors who insisted their lives matter,
the text is meant to be read and performed.
This book is openly available in digital formats thanks to a generous grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
Track list:
1. Asafo Ko Eyi Hͻn, 1b. Ngyedum Gye Do
2. Ya ara Nkyε/Nkum na Abandze
3. WÍ»nfa Nyε HÍ»n Nanom
4. Eminsa Osuom
5. ͻawar Eminsa
6. Nana Sesa Kwesi
7. Gyesi Mbo
8. Maayε Kwansin m’abε
9. Dua No Ebu
10. Okura Akεkyer Egyinambowa ne ba
11. Adende
12. Oye, Oye
13. ͻkͻtͻfo Gyesi
14. Safohen Odum
15. Kweku Anankor ei
16. Yekͻr Akyemfo Nyimpa nnyi hͻ
17. Nkoa No WÍ» KÍ»
18. Í»roko W’anyε Yie
19. Egya Yεma Hom AkÍ»aba
20. Biribi Reba e
Kormantse
Recording Date: 5th July 2021
Location: University of Cape Coast, Department of Music and Dance Recording
Studios
Supervisor: Dr. Eric Otchere
Technicians: Mr. Philip Afari and Mr. Jehoshaphat Phillip Sarbah
Facilitator: Mr. Francis Fiifi Essel
Recording Sponsor: Nana Ama Oforiwaa Aduonum, PhD
Kormantse Bentsir Asafommba

Name Role Lineage
Ekow Ninson Gyina ho hwε Í»kyerεma (Drummer) Agona
Kobena Bedu Nwomtonyi (Lead singer) Domna
Kwesi Bronya Asafommba (Chorus) Asona
Nana Kweku Ntsiwa Asafommba (Chorus) Asona
Kwesi Kom Asafommba (Chorus) Anona
Kofi Nkrumah Asafommba (Chorus) Anona
Kwame Alaatakyi Asafommba (Chorus) Agona
Kofi Fakyem Asafommba (Chorus) Aboradze
Francis Kofi Essel (Facilitato)r