Born in Accra, Ghana, west Africa, Selasee Atiase learnt to play guitar and started composing and performing gospel music during his early teenage years with his local church group. However, he had a strong desire to reach beyond the gospel audience.
His first attempt to further this ambition was by joining a group called Makuma, made up of five singers. Soon he enrolled on a 3 year music program at the school of performing arts at the University of Ghana in Legon.
In August 1996, Selasee performed in front of an audience of 5,000 people at a seminar at the International Trade Fair site in Accra. Through this he met Sean Cassidy from Montreal, Canada, who was among the attendees. They immediately became brothers and have been good friends ever since.
Shortly after connecting, Sean sponsored the recording of Makuma's first album and also helped record an album for his local church group know as 'Heart to Heart'. In 1998, the church group was invited to perform at the Worldwide seminar at the Minneapolis Convention Center; after which they stayed an extra week to record a second album. Selasee graduated from the University of Ghana in Legon in May 1999 and moved to the U.S.A. the same year with the dream to pursue his own musical vision.
After a of couple years in Utah and a brief six month sojourn in southern California - during which he worked variety of odd jobs as well as composing tunes and performing at coffee houses and some restaurants - he increasingly gained confidence and finally moved to Boulder, Colorado. Here he became the lead singer of a local band that soon became one of the "hot" groups in town.
He started recording his new songs at Flabbey Road Studios in Boulder. In 2003, during a meating with Sean Cassidy in Minneapolis, he gave him a copy of the new tunes he had recorded. Sean being impressed by his new tunes promptly signed on as his manager. He then created RunningDream Records to represent Selasee's growing music career.
Sean attended the 2005 Midem in Cannes, France where he presented one of Selasee's compositons, a Reggae track entitled 'RUN'. 'RUN' was consequently selected as a sound track for the EA Sports 'Fifa 2006' soccer video game available for X-Box, Playstation2, PSP and Nintendo Game Cube. Coincidentally, Ghana his country, for the first time qualified to participate in the 2006 Football World Cup competition.
Finally, Selasee's first debut album was recorded with RunningDream records at Immersive Studios and Home away from Home Studios in Boulder, Colorado. Selasee's original songs have the unique blend of American Pop, Reggae and West African Hi-life music. With a mix of English and West African lyrics, his unique voice will captivate you instantly.
After landing a spot on the prestigious MIDEM 2006 Buzz Bands showcase, Selasee's music is currently impacting airwaves and enjoying success across the United States, Europe and West Africa. And most recently, Selasee has taken top honors with the International Songwriting Competition; placing first in the World Music category and second in the People's Choice category. The winners were selected out of almost 15,000 entries from 80 countries. Judges include Sonny Rollins, Macy Gray, Tom Waits, John Scofield and many others.
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http://www.selasee.com
http://www.myspace.com/selasee
http://selasee.livedigital.com |
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