JACODMARTS MANAGEMENT, a new talent management company in town has indicated its preparedness to take on the venture, major.
The company’s CEO, Kwaku Asiedu tells me his outfit is going to do something almost different. They will handle solely female acts.
“We are building tomorrow’s creative brands that will invest into society for what society has also invested into them without worrying about the stereotyping that comes with being a woman pursuing your dreams in the creative industry.” – CEO of Jacodmarts Management Kwaku Asiedu said.
“This is not about building brands that will amass wealth from society and later do works to celebrate no one but themselves, it’s about building lasting brands that society will always be proud of. This is not to make money but to change the perception people have about women in the creative industry.”
ARTISTE PROFILE
Ruth Williams is an Afro Jazz musician and a product of Tarkwa Secondary school. Her love for music drove her into starting a band called Chosen Generation in 2001.
After high school, and in between singing backups for artists at Jay Q’s Hush Hush Studios and looking for her own big break, Williams started Next Level, a group that placed fifth in the maiden edition of the NesCafé Revolution.
She returned with another group and placed fourth in the next edition.
“When I went to Hush Hush Studio Jay Q was on top producing all the hits, so getting the opportunity to sing backing on all the hit songs that was churned out during his reign did a lot to boost my confidence.”
After doing backups for many artists including now super group VVIP and FBS, Ruth who was then known as Pinky was introduced to Appietus to do backups for Kofi B, Ofori Amposah and C Zar.
“At a point I didn’t want to be a backup artist anymore, I felt I was ripe enough to do my own records to build my own brand and so I joined the Mentor train in 2006 and I placed third.”
“After Mentor, many of the producers who used to book me stopped; thinking after all the exposure I got from Mentor my fee to backup others was going to be huge. So it slowed down my backup and I started approaching them myself.”
“Truth is after Mentor it wasn’t easy but I have to admit musically I have achieved most of the things any aspiring musician will want to achieve but I just feel it’s time I take my music to the next level to put talent from the background into the main and serve more people with my God giving talent.”
“In Mentor, there are invisible hands controlling every move you make and the choices you make, and from the success I chocked under that kind of setup I think I function better under Mentor kind of setup because after the show I haven’t really gotten that kind of attention and I haven’t been successful like people hope I will be.”
Williams, who has been at this since 2003, believes this is her time to shine because she has learnt a lot musically, business wise and can now navigate her way through the dodgy terrain of the industry.
Jacquelyn Adwoa Kessie is a professional photographer who started out as a graphic designer.
“During my graphic design days, I was working on an artwork for a friend and the picture she presented for the project needed a lot of touching up to make the artwork I was designing come out great. After days of touching the picture up, I concluded I needed to broaden my knowledge in photography and now I am caught in photography more than any other thing.”
Encouraged by friends and family who were happy to see her step out more to locations and breaking her habit of staying at the desk everyday honing her skills in graphics, she took a liking for photography – instantly.
After completing St. Louis in Kumasi, Adwoa Kessie studied IT at NIIT. Adwoa Kessie never studied photography in a class; the classroom according to her is her day to day location experiences and challenges.
“Photography is telling stories using light. Many think it’s just a matter of pointing and shooting, but there’s a lot more that goes into making sure the environment in which the picture will be taking is right, how the light touches the subject and what story the picture should tell with a glance.”
“With photography, the excitement varies, there are times you’re in full control of everything that is happening and there are times you have absolutely no control of what happens. When you have a model in a studio, you can control the lights, the poses, emotions and almost every detail, but when you are shooting an event like a wedding, someone out of nowhere can walk into a winning shot that had almost everything you wished for and spoils the shot and you might never get that shot again.”
“Photography as a business is a tough one because many refuse to appreciate the kind of effort and work that goes into getting the shots that tells the story, and people don’t understand every little equipment you bring along to a shoot goes a long way to enhance the shots you take.”
“So sometimes you send an invoice to a potential client and they wonder why you want to charge them that much just to point a camera at them and shoot.” VISIT HER FACEBOOK PAGE
“I don’t see myself doing anything but photography, all I want to do now is to be very successful at this so anyone coming up can look up to me as an inspiration.”
“I believe in passionate than a knowledgeable person; a passionate person would do anything at any time to achieve the satisfaction involved in what they are doing but a knowledgeable person without passion can give up at any time.”
Kessie likes to capture moments that would remain priceless for years.
“You can always plan a studio shoot with a model over and over again with the same props, but when you capture a the same model on the run way of a high profile fashion show with all the celebrities sitting in the front row, those moments will be hard to reproduce.
By: Abdullai Isshak/enewsgh.com