Bamaya Dance in Northern Ghana

Dance is a form of entertainment isn’t it? Some people define dance as steps or movements usually performed to music for pleasure or as a form of social interaction. I think dance is just a movement of the body. Interestingly, day in day out there are different dances that emerge from different cultures. These dances are usually categorized into traditional dances and modern dances.

Taking Ghana as a typical example some traditional dances include; adowa, bamaya jara, takai, tora, agbadza, kete, kpalongo among others. Most of these traditionlal dances are danced to the music produced from drums, gongs and other traditional musical instruments.

Men dancing Jara in the Northern Region of Ghana

Some modern dances in Ghana include; Azonto, cripple, moon walk, alarm shake and many others. Most of these dances are performed to the rhythms of gospel, highlife, hip pop and hiplife music.

My focus however is on Bamaya, a dance by the Dagombas; a large ethnic group located in  the Northern part of Ghana. Bamaya means “the river (valley) is wet”. This dance is mostly performed by men who are usually dressed in feminine clothes. 

Bamaya dance by both men and women

Bamaya which was first danced in the 19 century marked the end of a long drought . It is said that when the drought ended, the men had to dress as women to give thanks to the gods because it was believed that the prayers of women usually got a quicker response.

Bamaya nowadays is however danced by not just men, but also women. It is so lovely to watch as the men especially gracefully move and twist their waists  and act just like women in the dance.

Enjoy some bamaya dances in the links below;

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aL9kn6_9WHI 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKly3V8Kcp8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnr8Au5uCpc

KIITOS!