A few months after being honoured at the Ghana Music Awards held at the National Theatre, Accra, gospel musicians in the country were last Saturday called up again for more awards at the same venue. This time the occasion was the Ghana Gospel Music Awards ceremony.

The awards covered works produced between the year 2000 and 2002. For this reason many followers of gospel music put their bet on Cindy Thompson whose album, Cindy’s Messiah, captured the music scene three years ago, to sweep the top awards. And when the bell tolled for the giants of Ghanaian Gospel Music to come up-stage for honours, Cindy was there — she picked three top awards for Best Gospel Song (Awanwa Do), Best Gospel Album (Cindy’s Messiah) and Best Praise Song (Awanwa Do).

Each award like the others at stake, attracted a ?20 million insurance cover, a plaque and copies of the Bible. Cindy also received CFA 2 million plus a licence to represent Ghana at the All-Africa Gospel Festival scheduled to come off in Benin in August.

Other award winners were Suzzy and Matt who produced the Best Worship Song during the year under review; Kojo Folson who won the Best Instrumental Music Award and the Joyful Way Incorporated, awarded for giving their album, Barima Yesu, the Best Packaging/Sleeve Design.

The award for Best Video went to the Soul Winners, Best Male Voice — Kofi Dua-Anto of the Da Project; Best Discovery — Jude Lomotey; Best Mass Ministry — Joyful Way Incorporated; Best Medium Ministry — Soul Winners; Best Small Ministry — Daughters of Glorious Jesus; Best Acapella Alabaster Box and the Best Choral Group — the Winneba Youth Choir.

Special awards were also presented to a number of people who have contributed to the growth of music in general and gospel music in particular. They are Mrs Dinah Reindorf and Mrs Eunice Addison who was honoured for composing many Pentecostal songs including the very popular Adze Kor. Others on the list of special award winners are Rev Dr Emmanuel Lartey, T. V. O. Lamptey, Professor Kofi Abraham, Elder Mireku, Rev Michael Osei Bonsu and Diana Akiwumi.

The show which was graced by the celebrated Nigerian gospel singer Sam Okoro and Togolese Raizor Lainor experienced a real baptism of technical hiccups and it was quite funny but embarrassing as the MCs for the night, MacDiamond Nyamekor and Jackie Ankrah occasionally apologised on behalf of the organisers for the hitches.

In view of this and other minuses, it is suggested that in future the organisers, S&S Media Concepts, should do a lot more rehearsals before the show. And during the programme they should elect only one person at a time to present each of the awards rather than bringing onstage three/four persons to present one prize — one person announces the award, another picks and opens the envelope to announce the winner and then another person presents the award — that was too much and it was not surprising that the process sometimes got jammed.

However, loads of commendation go to S&S Media Concepts for identifying all the problems as they came, and taking steps to rectify them with speed and alacrity. They may also be forgiven because that was their first time, though that cannot pass as an excuse.Every single performance by the artistes on the bill was hot. The Daughters of Glorious Jesus were superb, Suzzy and Matt were too much for the ecstatic audience, the Soul Winners were pleasantly loud and hot.

With their sweet angelic voices, the Winneba Youth Choir literally brought down the Holy Spirit into the theatre while the John Teye Memorial School Band set the house on fire with their exemplary stagecraft. It was a delight to watch as young girls from the school blew the trumpet and other wind instruments with such masterful zeal.And when Cindy Thompson came on stage to present the winning song, Awanwa Do, all feet and hands in the theatre moved left, right, left, right with much joy and heartfelt appreciation.