The story is often told about the mother cheetah who
comes back home from the hunt to find her cubs have been trampled to death by elephants. Knowing that she is no match for these giants, she blames and kills a herd of
goats.
Similarly, when a group of Kenyan musicians took to
the streets last week calling for less Nigerian and
Tanzanian music, they were killing goats. The elephant in
this case is history. However, not even history is a match
for innovation.
It’s funny, but the country music star Kenny Rogers can
come to Kenya today, charge an arm and a leg, and play a
month of sold-out stadium gigs. Yet his heyday was in the
‘80s. The same holds true for top-tier Nigerian acts. Their
time, however, is now. Kenya seems predisposed to
preferring the foreign, the exotic, the western. At the risk of
being accused of bringing up ‘that old trope,’ it all began
with the erosion of our culture when the colonialists came.
Colonialism eroded Kenyan culture I dare say more than it
did in West Africa, in Uganda, in Tanzania. Kenya was a
settler state. The Brits had no plans of going anywhere.
Ever. And in their assistance, and under duress, we threw
the culture baby out with the pagan bath water and planted
the Church and the Union Jack over the scene of the crime
dressed in mandatory, state-issued calico cloth threatened
by the physical and mental whips of our settler masters.
And when the new government in independent Kenya
clamped down on the Funk movement of the late 70s along
with all other artistic expression, threatening and jailing
academics in the universities and strangling the media, we
shrunk into our cocoons, allowing ourselves instead to be
satiated and sedated by the likes of ABBA , The Bee Gees
and The Beatles. Homegrown innovation had been dealt a
blow that would take us decades to recover from. I was
born middle class (and English-speaking) in the ‘70s. My
predilection for all things Western was established early in
life. I would be irritated, nay embarrassed, when I’d get
home from school and find the housekeeper blasting ‘that
shady Rhumba.’ When I began my music career in the 90s
there weren’t many Kenyan musicians to look up to.
Anyone who had managed to record anything had been
condemned by society to dying, drunk or living poor, a
result of ‘loose morals and bad choices.’
I’m always slightly embarrassed when I introduce myself to
folks I meet around the continent. I’m ‘Eric,’ while the SouthAfricans are ‘Kgomotso'; the Nigerians are ‘Olusegun.’
Even while the Tanzanians might be ‘Damien’– pronounced
‘Da-mi-YEN’– they speak Kiswahili with such ease and
fluidity having studied subjects like Biology in their
national language.
The Kiswahili language rolls off their tongues like honey to the easy beat of Bongo Flavour, as close as you can get to Zouk singing on dry land. As a result, in Tanzania, American Idol loses pride of place to Project Bongo , a reality show focusing on homegrown talent. Conversely, urban Kenyans get as far as Sheng, a hybrid of Kiswahili and vernacular so diverse that kids fromestates separated by as little as a highway have different names for the same thing.
Sheng dictionaries become obsolete by the time they go to press, owing to the rapidity in the change of vocabulary. A Sheng speaker can date you to within a year of your birth, locate your home to within a street by the word you use for ‘car’ or ‘mobile phone.’
in the rural areas, Kiswahili is as foreign as Greek, and is
spoken only by those who might have picked it up in schoolor by those ethnicities whose ethnic language shares acommon Bantu base with Kiswahili, akin to that between Italian and Spanish. We claim to have a national language
Then comes the issue of national pride. If Nigerians were to group the peoples of the world in order of superiority they would place themselves first. Them. The Americans.
Manchester United. In that order. They have a very healthy
self-image. In music the battle between Nigeria and Kenya
continues to be fought mainly in the latter. I’m not sure
Naija musicians even know there’s a contest running, and
are a mixture of bemused and irritated by the prevalence of
their music on our media observed when they visit. Urban
legend recounts a Naija artist rebuking a Kenyan journalist
for fawningly informing him that he was more famous than
any Kenyan artist in Kenya. “This would never happen in
Nigeria,” he said. I want to thank him but I’m not sure that
this isn’t a threat.
Where Nigerians are proud, Kenyans are mild-mannered.
Where Nigerians are loud, we are meek. We suffer silently
and only let our anger come out in large expressions of
violence that shock the world. If a coup breaks out in most
parts of Africa today it’s greeted by a sigh and a ‘ho-hum’
by the Western world. When one thousand Kenyans meet
their deaths at the hands of their own countrymen the world stops. It takes one million Rwandese to get a similar effect.
We are non-confrontational as a people and the largely
conservative masses led by an even more conservative
elite are happier to hunker down behind their corporate
desks, more content with the bottom line than the shaking
of bottoms. We pray for the day we will beat Nigeria at
football. We’re used to losing to them. For the sake of the
Nigerian team we hope that that victory happens in Kenya.
At least we will grant them asylum. Nigerians are not used
to losing to Kenya. If our victory happens in Lagos, no one
is leaving the stadium alive. We are, however, Africans together for international events.
As Kenyans, we held our breath with them when one of the preferred candidates to succeed Pope John Paul II , the
Nigerian Cardinal Arinze , got closer to the prize. But in
secret we thanked God that he wasn’t elected because we
would have never heard the end of it. For similar reasons,
before we sleep, we raise a prayer of thanksgiving that
Obama has Kenyan and not Nigerian roots. But this
inferiority complex has plagued us even since the African
Writer Series was founded in 1962- Chinua , Wole , Cyprian
Ekwensi, Elechi Amadi . Growing up we seemed to be more
aware of them than we were of Ngugi and Meja Mwangi ;
Soyinka’s The Lion and The Jewel getting more runs than
Imbuga’s Betrayal In The City.
But when Kenyan artists march the streets asking for more
airplay, what do they really mean? Surely they don’t mean a
total ban? Where would we be without Stevie? Michael
Jackson? The Beatles? Who wants to live a life without
Beyoncé? And would you really like to be in a club that
didn’t play Tiwa Savage , Chameleone , Diamond Platnumz?
And if we embraced a total ban of art coming from outside
Kenya, why stop there? Why not ban everything that wasn’t
local? Like technology. Ban the television, the cell phone,
the car, the computer. All innovation involves a certain
amount of borrowing. You’ve got to start at a known to get
to an unknown. You’ll hear the guitar lines of Kinshasa in
the music of Stromae , Iyanya and Davido; South African
rhythms and guitar lines are the signature of Paul Simon ’s
Graceland and Vampire Weekend ’s music. In researching
this piece, I confirmed the similarity between contemporary
Naija music and traditional Coastal East African Chakacha-
a driving 12-8, triplet feel heavily reliant on a 3-2 clave
that is the signature of Afro-Cuban music. The Ragga beat
behind Flavour’s “Nwa Baby ” is exactly the same as Chaka
Demus and Plier’s “Murder She Wrote,” just at a different
tempo, and the melody of the former is borrowed from the
1930s recording of “El Manicero” by Don Azpiazu Havana
Casino Orchestra . Only heaven knows where Don Azpiazu
got his version.
Is Kenya lagging behind in music? Our lawyers, bankers,
brewers can compete with any of their colleagues globally.
A Kenyan long distance runner need only beat his next-
door neighbour to stand a chance at being the best in the
world– recent culpability of doping notwithstanding. Naija
music is brazen. It is not timid or full of angst. It walks into
the club grabbing its crotch with its recreated sound of old
turned over on its head, with easy lines and catchy hooks
shotgunned by a thumping, ear-whomping, pulsating four-
to-the-floor kick drum that grabs you, shoves a beer down
your throat and promises you that tonight you will get
lucky. And it comes with all its friends.
When a Naija song plays, it’s charging at you through the speakers riding onthe reputations of all of Nigerian Highlife, Fela , King Sunny Ade , Majek Fashek , and more recently P-Square , 2face and D’banj . Add to that the dizzying pace at which they release new material and you’ve got a tsunami. Maybe Kenya has suffered from not having an all-embracing identity genre that helps artists ride on each other’s shoulders. I’ve always been a proponent of diversity, but it can be argued that there’s not a single Jamaican Reggae, Ragga or Dub artist who’s not running on the steam of Bob Marley , PeterTosh and their contemporaries.

Block of text. I can't read this. [url=Trailii]Put[/url] some paragraphs in this writeup.

Na talent. No be our fault
..




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Just less than a megabyte.

thanks for the support.

lovely exposé
gimme a link please

seriously Nigeria music industry is doing Nigeria pround.

meanwhile Kenya I suggest you guys hire good producers may be from America or Nigeria...

youngjohn the wicked producer...
sarz on the beat...
and so on

For the sake of the Nigerian team we hope that that victory happens in Kenya. At least we will grant them asylum. Nigerians are not used to losing to Kenya. If our victory happens in Lagos, no one is leaving the stadium alive.

This got me laughing.

Do we lament over their dominance of marathons and other long distance races? Dem better face front jor or better still go mop Lagos Lagoon. For dis music matter we dey generate power like a mikano.. Na we be kingkong.

Why do NIGERIANS think they own everything, or they the best in everything when its actually the opposite...

Personal opinion if you ask me. Every nation has what makes it unique. And by the way, what is the population of Kenya? They can't expect Kenya to be a global player in entertainment industry where we have Nigeria and South Africa. Nigeria with talents and market and South Africa with Technology and industry, other African nations should fall in line. If you doubt me, ask Jamaica what happened to them when USA is at the corner with big market, Technology and entertainment industry.

i think the lamentations was misplaced.and the dominance is non existend more so on african politics.kenyan music serve kenyans well abit of foriegn music is not ba as well.The nigerian music being played is not even 5%.For example if you ask an average kenyan to name you five nigerian musicians he or she will rarely go past two.As a liberal country kenyans will always have a choice of what they want not withstanding noises from some disgruntled musicians wannabes.As for african politics i think southafrica still does dominate the scene not even the economy and population of nigeria threatens that.Southafrica's foreign policy and influence by southafrican companies which are in almost every african country is what bloster it's dominance.Nigeria on the on the other hand has had its image tarnished by some immoral citizen who more often than not are invovled with a few scams or drug dealing here and there.Their goverment has no clear foreign policy may the govt of president mohamed buhari will do something to change this perception.Lastly we are all africans and we must appriciate that which origanates from africa before looking else where it is that which brings us together.So when Davido tours the U.S for a series of show before even steping to the next door neighbour,what does tells africans"that his product are tailored for americans who might not be intrested".Have self reflecting day.

Chesman10:
Personal opinion if you ask me. Every nation has what makes it unique. And by the way, what is the population of Kenya? They can't expect Kenya to be a global player in entertainment industry where we have Nigeria and South Africa. Nigeria with talents and market and South Africa with Technology and industry, other African nations should fall in line. If you doubt me, ask Jamaica what happened to them when USA is at the corner with big market, Technology and entertainment industry.

if you dint know, people in Kenya (in nairobi) actually listen to more Jamaican music than the rest, it's just that it's not from Africa thats why they don't bother... (it's an African thing ) but what everyone usually who talks about music industry in Kenya usually forgets is that Kenya is a multilingual, multicultured society, there are 43 tribes, each tribe has its own music industry that gets just fine without even going national, there are over 500 ethnic radio stations that play there own music in there own language.... then we have cosmopolitan cities like Nairobi that now play those foreign music that people complain about, other areas like coast of Kenya like bongo music from the coast and from Tanzania since there cultures and Swahili are the same, as for the rest of Kenya outside Nairobi and mombasa, those folks don't even know the difference btn a Nigerian or Ghanaian or south African music...

good music is good music, talent is talent, the market is there in Kenya, it's just that with a small population (44 million) piracy kills what artist were supposed to get... then artist end up not spending much in creating good sounds and videos since they aren't going to make returns from views online, or selling of music,


so technology is an advantage but it's not it, the moment the government embraces the music and entertaiment industry and sees it as a source of revenue, and starts protecting the market seriously, trust me , the music industry will shoot up over the roof

But surely if Kenyans can make such awesome music, just why cant they sell internationally?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjYDUm8DNrs


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZUoUxAhJmQ


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dhq46syzJI4


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHqBoLX40Ts


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtUCvSepH94


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mG1vIeETHc


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rd00ZV9yPAU


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ms0iTYIjy0g


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KaBf8YTJhgA


etc