Story By: Rahamatu-Lahi Zakaria || Sanatu Zambang
Music they say is universal and cut across irrespective of the tribe, location, or creed. Crave for good music is on the rise, just as every day, we come across a new crop of musicians.
In the last decade, northern music has seen a tremendous rise of the media talking about it, much focus on the musician and his fans rather than the actual work he is doing. People remember the musician and not the work.
Speaking during Sanatu Zambang Café Experience, IsRahim said one of the biggest challenge of northern music is the fan base. According to the Alubarika hit maker, northern music fan base follow artistes instead of music.
The fans do not appreciate good music. This phenomenon he says is suppressing the growth of underground artists and does not encourage creativity in the industry. Those with numbers he says will always come out with music that does not have merit because they know their fans will jam to it.
‘’ We have so many good artists who are releasing great songs but are not discovered because of the kind of fans we have. If we were to follow good music like we would not have one artiste in the region. We just follow who has the masses.’’
IsRahim
Another issue he highlighted that is retrogressing the industry is Management. What he says about management is that, when a team signs an artiste, it means the artiste has signed his/her freedom to them, so they dictate whatever the artistes can or cannot do. Creatively, the artistes cannot think again and has to rely solely on the management. This dependency he says does not allow the artiste to be creative and stifles his talent.
In every venture one needs capital to work so as artistes. IsRahim also talks of how challenging it is for artistes to funds their work, especially the artistes who do not have management or someone to borrow from.
One of the places artists make money is through the organizing of shows and to organize a show, one needs funds. But due to the lack of funds, most of them are not able to organize their own show, and the shows that they are called to perform, the event organizers do not pay them.
With regards to the funds, IsRahim suggest that the Minister for Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts should create a fund for artistes, where they can always go and borrow to work and later pay back from their proceeds.
