Categories: Entertainment

YACE Honoree David Sengeh Releases Music Video for ‘Ar Don Go’

Just a few weeks after successfully defending his Ph.D. at MIT Media Lab, Sierra Leonean David Moinina Sengeh has released a gif-laden music video for single “Ar Don Go.”

Produced by Ben Bloomberg and Brainy Beatz, “Ar Don Go” means in Sierra Leone creole “I have gone,” “I’ve left,” or literally, “watch me go.”

With an AfroBeats sound, the single encourages upward mobility and progress, with Sengeh (pictured) singing:

The Lord gi wi all some He gave me the looks
I got me the locks and dived in the books ya
chance is, we got me the lucks (ya)
to put this under lock where been di keys
been learning to since kindergarten
working hard, en no fighting

Work equals Force times distance (ya math)
Day dream is force with no distance so
work hard and do send remittances
tough times and what the balance is
doesn’t define you or what the status quo is
Fame, di gains, always quoted,
di strains, di pain, let’s celebrate them

No one says it would be easy
cool di tempo (ya) feel di breazy
look you look me look we done go

Watch “Ar Don Go” here:

Sengeh, who is a 2014 YACE “Youth and Innovation” Awardee, told Face2Face Africa that he seeks to offer youth a “different perspective” from what they are usually exposed to in music.

“‘Ar Don Go,’ like most of the songs I do, really is focused on offering young African AfroBeat lovers a different perspective of what it means to be ‘successful,'” Sengeh says.

“In the music scene, especially hip-hop, success is measured in how many ladies, watches, flights, etc. one has and how much money one spends at the bar. So ‘Ar Don Go’ touches on these issues and gives the freedom to others to brag about nerdy things like winning the Lemelson-MIT Prize, the most prestigious award an innovative graduate student can win at MIT and now USA.”

Sengeh can name drop the award because he is a recipient of the prize. He was also named in 2013 as Forbes‘ “30 Under 30 in Technology” and named on Wired‘s “Smart List.”

A 2014 TED fellow, Sengeh designs prosthetic sockets and wearable interfaces and is the co-founder and president of NGO Global Minimum Inc., which spurs innovation among high school students in Kenya and Sierra Leone.

Abena Agyeman-Fisher

Abena Agyeman-Fisher is the Editor-in-Chief of Face2Face Africa. Most recently, she worked for Interactive One as the Senior Editor of NewsOne, she worked for AOL as the News Programming Manager of Black Voices, which later became HuffPo Black Voices, and for the New York Times Company as an Associate Health Editor. Abena, a Spelman College graduate, has been published in Al Jazeera, the Daily Beast, New Jersey’s The Star-Ledger, the Grio, BlackVoices, West Orange Patch, About.com, the Source, Vibe, Vibe Vixen, Jane, and Upscale Magazines. She has interviewed top celebrities, icons, and politicians, such as First Lady Michelle Obama, Senior Advisor to the President Valerie Jarrett, Civil Rights activist and diplomat Andrew Young, comedian Bill Cosby, Grammy Award-winning singer Jill Scott, actress and singer Queen Latifah, Olympic Gold winner Cullen Jones, international supermodel Alek Wek, and five-division world champion boxer Floyd Mayweather. Most recently, she served as the First Lady’s press reporter during President Barack Obama’s U.S.-Africa Summit, Young African Leaders Institute event, and the 2013 presidential trip to Senegal, Johannesburg, Cape Town, and Tanzania. Abena is also a 2015 International Women's Media Foundation Africa Great Lakes Fellow, where she reported on women candidates and Chinese sweatshops in Tanzania for CNN and Refinery29.