How Flavour Chose Highlife Over Afrobeats — And Won Africa's Heart

Forbes

11-07-2025

Flavour, Nigerian Highlife artist, known for modernizing the genre while honoring his Igbo roots.
While his contemporaries chased Afrobeats, Flavour chose to modernize Highlife for a new generation. Now, with a Warner Music deal and a worldwide fanbase, he's proving there's power in staying true to what you love.
Last year, I had the pleasure of dialoguing with Nigerian Highlife music legend Flavour N'abania while he was in the middle of his African Royalty European Tour taking on stages in France, Spain, Portugal, and the United Kingdom, a run that not only highlighted his staying power in Nigeria and West Africa, but also his global appeal.
Born Chinedu Okoli, Flavour performed, and often does, in front of audiences that range across generations, continents, and cultures. An Igbo native, his reach has extended far beyond ethnic ciphers. He doesn't just appeal to Nigerians in the diaspora, he speaks to the larger African apparatus and those who admire it.
When we spoke, Flavour was gearing up to perform at the OVO Arena Wembley, the biggest solo UK show of his career. He had performed in Britain many times, but this concert was different. ​​'I've been performing in the UK for quite some time,' he told me. 'But this should be the biggest venue I'm ever headlining. That would be my own concert.'
Flavour stands as a dominant force in modern Highlife music, and genre that is not new to the African music scene. It is a genre that predates Afrobeats and its founding precursor, Afrobeat (yes, there is a difference).
Highlife arose in the Fante coast of Ghana in the 19th century, where natives curated infectious polyrhythms through primarily brass instruments, local drums, guitars, the Akan Seprewa—some which derived from Caribbean soldiers and British military brass bands. From Ghana's Kwame Asare and E.T. Mensah to Nigeria's Bobby Benson, Victor Olaiya, and Rex Jim Lawson, by the 1950s Highlife was the staple sound of West Africa.
With subsectors of the genre coming to fruition, mainly due to ethnic lines, Igbo Highlife arose in the 1960s with the likes of the Oriental Brothers International Band, Osita Osadebe, and Celestine Ukwu. Fast forward to the millennium, where Flavour is not only dominant in the ethnic sector of the genre, but the greater Highlife music genre across the continent of Africa.Flavour, Nigerian Highlife star, has captivated audiences across Africa, Europe, and the diaspora.
We talked about his decision to remain a torchbearer for Highlife, even as Afrobeats exploded globally. In 2008, it was the primetime for 2Baba, 9nice, D'banj, MI Abaga, P-Square, Timaya, Wande Coal, some of them already veterans. 2Baba was already on his third album (post his 2004 hit 'African Queen'). 9nice put Yoruba incented Afropop on the map with 'Gongo Aso,' and P-Square was already a decade in the game and dominating the waves with their hit 'Do Me.'
And it wasn't that Flavour couldn't make an Afrobeats hit. He was simply on another wave and desired to stick and preserve the foundational West African art form of Highlife, in his own way. When he dropped his debut album that year, N'abania, it was a hit among Igbos and the SouthEast region and fairly translated into outer regions.
Flavour reflected on the state of Highlife when he entered the Nigerian music scene, explaining, 'Before I came in, it's been kind of a big fire because, you know, everybody was moving into Afrobeats and all,' he said. 'But like I always tell them, Africa is rich in music. And now Afrobeats is popping, it is now left for us to showcase other genres in full, so we don't get people stuck listening just to Afrobeats. Because African music has different genres, which Highlife is one of them.'
Though he was trained as a versatile, professional musician capable of many styles, Flavour made a deliberate decision to devote himself to Highlife, saying, 'When I was coming on, a proper musician, I could do so many kinds of music. But I chose Highlife because of its resonance with me.'
Flavour and Highlife legend Bright Chimezie pictured together at London's OVO Arena during his ... More 'African Royalty European Tour.'
As he stepped into his solo career, he wrestled with how to position himself, recalling, 'Coming out as an artist, I was like telling myself, which way do I go? I don't want to, you know, join everyone, look like, you know, I want to be different. I want to interpret my music differently. I want to be seen differently.'
Over the years, Flavour has remained committed to evolving the genre. As he put it, 'That's what I've been doing over the years, trying to modernize Highlife, trying to recreate it and give it some kind of modern sound that everybody can vibe to, not just the old, young, middle class, and of course other continents, not just Africa.'
And he surely did manage to reach beyond Nigeria. It is easy to make an post hoc ergo propter hoc assumption about Flavour's reach, and think he made it in Nigeria before he made it elsewhere within the continent. However, the 'Ada Ada' singer was rather popular in Eastern Nigeria, where the Igbo ethnic group is stationed.
'I was lucky enough to not just because initially, my fame didn't start from the East, it didn't go to Lagos, it didn't go to the West, it didn't go to the rest of Nigeria,' Flavour recalled. 'From the Eastern part of Nigeria, it went straight into the other African countries. From the Afrikaner, Sierra Leone, I was already doing shows there before I even came to Lagos. They were like, 'ah, there's this Nigerian guy.' Some Lagosians were like, 'Oh, wow, we've not heard of him.'
Instead of that popularity translating to the West or North of the country, it became a sensation in South Africa, Sierra Leone, and Tanzania. It was his 2011 song, 'Nwa Baby (Ashawo Remix)'—also a remake of Rex Jim Lawson's (also known as Cardinal Rex) 1960 hit 'Sawale,' in what became a continental hit, easily disseminating through the ears of diasporians and enthusiasts alike, that caused the regional virality.
'When we landed in South Africa, all the immigration officers spotted me and they came to me. They didn't even know who the other guys were,' he said. 'The guys that were so big in Lagos and all, they didn't know them. I wasn't even dressed like a star. I didn't know what it's all about. I was just fresh from the East. So when I got to South Africa, one guy came to me and was like, 'you're a big star over here. I hope you know that.'
Flavour, Nigerian Highlife star, has captivated audiences across Africa, Europe, and the diaspora.
According to Flavour, he 'never' felt like a star in Nigeria. Only in sectors of the east.
Well, such reach goes under denied as of today and goes so far. Last November, Flavour signed a deal with Warner Music Africa and Africori. He will now be subjected to refined A&R and marketing forces, which are bound to attract profound opportunities for the Highlife artist.
Flavour's career is a message to those who don't dare to be different. Dare to be different. The expected outcome may go astray, but the unexpected holds the possibility to be a grandeur.