Rhythms not been easy journey— KOD
Media personality and fashionista Kofi Okyere Darko, popularly known as KOD, celebrates 10 years of his annual fashion and music show, Rhythms On Da Runway, this year and reveals it has not been all rosy inspite of the glitz and glamour.
It has certainly not been an easy journey operating in a society that doesn’t understand the business of creativity.
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Taking us down memory lane in a chat with Daily Graphic on Tuesday, November 1, he said “It’s been the usual ups and downs because you have an idea but then you live in a society that doesn’t really understand how things ought to work in the orange economy, sometimes you are not able to execute things the way you plan to do.
“However, if I have to do it all over again, there is not a single thing I would change, I still like how things have gone so far apart from the hurdles of getting things done or getting the business community to understand how things ought to be done in the creative space”, he stated.
The Journey
Asked if he can confidently say that every event has got better over the years, he admitted, “Yes, we can, looking at where we started from, we started from a very small event centre that launched the birth of Ohemaa Kids Collection, named after my daughter, Ohemaa, a very simple event at the old Headlines Hospitality, which is also the old Twist Night Club in Labone.
“From there, we went to Citizen Kofi for one event then to Golden Tulip for two events, then we took a break because there was no money.
“We went to the State House for the Ghana @ 50 edition, we have been to the Osu Castle for the Year of Return edition and then we did one live on GHOne TV which was the only fashion show in Ghana that has taken place live on TV.
‘’We have not only got better in terms of the designers who exhibit collections, we’ve gone beyond becoming a Ghanaian brand. The BBC describes Rhythms On Da Runway as the biggest cultural expose in Africa and we have not looked back since its inception’’.
Pan African Event
“It is a Pan African event, it has gone beyond being an event that has only Ghanaian fashion designers and it also has creatives in the music and fashion industry from the African Diaspora as well taking part so it is an African and African Diaspora event”, he added.
At this point, one of the Communications Directors for the event, Terry Mingle, threw in a few words on what to expect at this year’s event which is scheduled for the Grand Arena on Sunday, November 20, 2022.
‘’This year being the 10th edition happens to be an opportune time, we get the chance to actually celebrate what we haven’t done before which is combining football and fashion, people who will usually only enjoy their football fantasy will do that on the green carpet, people who are connected to sports will come and celebrate with us.
‘’We are actually celebrating the ingenuity of African fashion on that day which happens to be the day the World Cup starts. We are kicking things off informally at 2pm because that is when the opening ceremony of the World Cup starts but the actual event starts at 4pm.
“For the past five years, we have honoured certain Pan African giants at the event, some of the past recipients are Richard Mofe-Damijo (RMD), Obrafour, Reggie Rockstone, the late Ricci Osei, Asabea Cropper and her brother, Kente Man, among others. This year being our monumental 10th edition, we are honouring former First Lady Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, Nigerian musician 2Face, former Miss World, Lisa Hannah, Roberta Annan and Freedom Jacob Caesar.
“Sarkodie is headlining this year’s event and there will also be performances by Sonti from South Africa, DJ Neptune from Nigeria, Epixode, Eno Barony, MzVee, Ofori Amponsah, Kwabena Kwabena, Akwaboah, Jackie Ankrah, among others.
Away from Rhythms On Da Runway, we picked KOD’s thoughts on the current state of the media in Ghana, “We had control back in the day when there was just traditional media and we had the likes of GBC, GNA and Daily Graphic. The advent of private media and social media kind of changed things a bit in terms of quality and professionalism because now, it is all about sensationalism, people don’t really care about doing things the right way.
“People can’t even write well, they are on radio and they can’t communicate and people are reporting unethically but it has become the norm because people want to trend. Some of us were taught to do things the right way. Society seems to have accepted things the way they are.
“We still have some fabulous presenters around like Kwami Sefa Kayi, Andy Dosty, Doreen Andoh, Elvis Crystal, Nana Aba Anamoah and a host of others,’’ he said.
Meanwhile KOD is back on Radio Gold as host of Weekend Spectacular, a show he used to host about 20 years ago. “It is on from 7p.m. to 10p.m. on Fridays and the feedback has been amazing.
People were looking forward to hearing my voice on radio and I am excited to be back on that network because that is where it all started”, he said.