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The song is also part of a 10-track album, aimed at revitalizing popular Ghanaian genres like highlife and palmwine music, which emerged in the 19th century during the English colonial period through the fusion of West African rhythms with Western styles and instruments, like jazz and guitars. These genres influenced Afrobeat in the 1960s, as pioneered by Fela Kuti, which was political and critical of social injustice. 

Today, highlife and palmwine music are also foundational to the globally acclaimed Afrobeats.

Brew is a doctoral candidate in music and Africana studies at the University of Pittsburgh and a predoctoral fellow at the Carter G. Woodson Institute for African American and African Studies. His current project is at the intersection of musical and ecological sustainability from a Black perspective of Gifts. 

He hopes the music can reinforce the cultural idea of nature as a gift and prompt people to advocate for the gifts they have inherited. “A gift suggests a need for reciprocity and to think about what we owe back,” he said.

Focused on creating collaborative projects with other artists from Ghana, Brew is set to release eight other tracks from his upcoming album. (Contributed photo)

Brew was first exposed to music in church before trying to make a living as a musician, an experience he said heavily influenced his graduate studies.

“I wanted to understand why artists struggled to make a living in Ghana and beyond, a topic I call ‘music career sustainability,’” he said. “After doing that, I was later exposed to critical environmental degradation going on in my home country caused by illegal gold mining,” also known as “galamsey” (gather and sell them).

This influenced Brew’s interest in the relationship between sustainability, music and the environment, and in the accompanying album he is working on with fellow Ghanaian musicians to explore environmental consciousness.

Before “Asaase Nnwom,” he released his first song, titled “Galamsey,” last year. This song features musicians Wanlov the Kubolor and Quami. Through this collaboration, Brew’s perspectives about the galamsey shifted.

“When I first wrote my verse, I blamed local communities,” he said. “As soon as Wanlov the Kubolor heard it, he quickly corrected me that the people to blame are the elites at the top and that locals are just trying to survive in a system they did not create.” 

But while “Galamsey” is a more apocalyptic account of environmental devastation, Brew said “Asaase Nnwom” is a more hopeful appeal.

This month, Brew defends his dissertation at the University of Pittsburgh before wrapping up his fellowship at the Woodson Institute this summer.