User:Ckorokeyi/Tonye Christopher

Tonye Christopher
Tonye Christopher, real name Christopher Ebitonye, is a Nigerian-American hip-hop music artist, guitarist, and producer from Columbus, Ohio. “Tonye” is Nigerian and translates into english as “the one who brings.” So the name is said to mean “The one who brings Christopher.”

History
In his early college years at the University of Dayton, Christopher focused on learning to play the guitar and performing live as an acoustic soul singer/songwriter. In the fall of 2009 Christopher quit his job in Dayton, Ohio and moved to New York City to pursue his music career full-time. Technically living in Hoboken, NJ, Christopher would take the PATH train and subway to travel to open mic nights throughout the city. It was during this time period that Christopher veered away from the Acoustic Soul sound and moved more towards a pop/rock infused hip-hop sound. Initially he began producing tracks for other local artists to record to, however he would eventually begin to produce songs for himself.

After only three months of living in NYC Christopher moved back to Ohio and would return to school for Fashion Product Development at The Ohio State University in March of 2010. He was able to produce all the music for his first hip-hop album “Buckeye Love Vol. 1: The Buzz” during his three month stint in the big apple, and would spend the next nine months writing and recording the lyrics to the music. This album was released in August 2010 featuring the singles Buckeye Love, Like A Bomb, and I Dreamt I Was A Rock Star.

In the winter of 2010 Christopher began production on his next album, “Buckeye Love Vol. 2: Drunk Dials and Heart Trials.” The expected release date of this album is tentatively St. Patrick's Day of 2011 (03/17/2011). The first single off of this album is a song called Nothing Fancy.

Style
Christopher's music is primarily the product of sampling his own guitar riffs from jam sessions in his personal studio, and layering electronic instruments and vocals over those. The music crosses many genres but generally captures elements of hip-hop and singer-songwriter genres. He produces most of the music in Pro Tools using a Mac Book.