Billy Kahora
3 August 2008
Nairobi — Kenyan-based music producer Robert RKay Kamanzi has won the British Council's International Young Music Entrepreneur award for 2008 for his production of Wakenya Pamoja.
The song, a composition by several Kenyan musicians, was meant to reunite Kenyans following the post-election violence early this year.
Kamanzi was cited by the judges as a "passionate advocate for the power of music, with the capacity to act as an advocate across business, social, educational and political perspectives."
Kamanzi led a field of emerging- market music professionals from Latin America, Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Eastern Europe.
The nominees were a mixed bag -- a recording executive from Colombia key to the country's musical policy; a radio host from Estonia; a promoter of live music in Jordan; a Lithuanian promoter of dance music; a Malaysian responsible for "monetising" music in his country; a radio station founder from India; the national co-ordinator of the Music Industry Association of Nigeria; a Polish visionary mainstreaming her country's music into "world music;" and a Venezuelan who founded a DJ school in his country.
"When I producing the song in February," says Kamanzi, "my biggest wish was that it be played on Madaraka Day."
And it came to pass that during this year's June 1 Madaraka Day celebrations, several Kenyan musicians, including Suzanne Owiyo, Abby and Rufftone did perform Wakenya Pamoja before a capacity crowd, with President Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga gracing the occasion.
As the musicians performed, the resounding chorus from the crowd turned the occasion into a concert of sorts.
Like Kuna Dawa, Esther Wahome's popular hit, Wakenya Pamoja is stamped with an appealing hymnal realism.
The video's release on You-tube received 15,000 hits in its first three weeks. The Kamanzi-produced Kuna Dawa did at least one million cassettes and 400,000 CDs in two years.
Born and raised in Burundi, Kamanzi came to Kenya in 1993 as a refugee.
In 2001, he formed a musical group and released one of the first vernacular Kenyan fusion -- tracks in the Kamba language -- during an age when anything not in English was frowned upon.
Kamanzi joins a long list of Kenyan artists recognised internationally but operating in a context largely without signposts, a blank slate where "cultural workers" remain at best footnotes to national socio-political agendas and at worst ceremonial oddities.
KAMANZI'S AWARD IS YET another wake-up call for the powers that be to the potential of the country's creative cultural sector and its role in enhancing the economy. In December 2004, the World Bank issued a report titled Integrated Value Chain Analysis of Kenya's Music Industry: Critical Challenges and Opportunities, which declared that Kenya's music economy was worth a potential Ksh4.7 billion.
Kamanzi, a major contributor in the industry, has applied the recommendations of the report to his company -- Moja Entertainment Ltd -- with resounding success. However, Kenya's music industry continues to suffer from piracy, as millions of dollars in taxes and government revenue are lost in the theft of intellectual property.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2008 The East African. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
