Piracy is killing a well-paying talent, warns singer
Loise Kim, known for her songs Munjiari (Kikuyu for parent) and Taranda (talent) says top artistesmake up to Sh100,000 performing for a couple of hours.
She drives a Range Rover and is building a mansion on Thika Road only five years after entering the gospel music industry. “I cannot deny that performing artistes make good money in this country,” Loise Kim, known for her songs Munjiari (Kikuyu for parent) and Taranda (talent) says.
Top artistes, she told the Business Daily this week, make up to Sh100,000 performing for a couple of hours.
Kim, born Loise Njeri Githuku, is upbeat and reveals how she identified her talent in gospel music.
At 38, she has tried a number of businesses, including the hitherto chaotic matatu sector.
She has a brief but sad report about the business: you don’t go to bed happy, your crew steals from you and police harass you. She left it in 2005.
A year later, Kim identified her singing talent: “At our chama (an informal buiness grouping) we decided in 2006 to compose songs for every meeting.”
Her first song, Munjiari, was an instant success.
“You composed a song at your event. Our group used to visit the parents and that is how my first song was called Munjiari (Kikuyu for parent) came to be. The tune was so successful that when I sang it to fellow women, they all cried.”
Kim operates on a tight schedule since her diary is fully booked for performances that include business tours by firms promoting products.
Last week, Kim, who sings in Kikuyu language, was with Equity Bank and Royal Media Services on a tour across the country to promote their products.
“Such tours are the main sources of making money for artistes in this country.” However, against the background of success and considerable fame, she enumerates hidden costs that walk in tandem with her as a parent and a late-night artiste.
“I really regret being unable to be there for my children a lot more,” says Kim, adding that her marriage broke up.
About performing at night events, she volunteers: “Some of my engagements have turned me into an owl of sorts and when most Kenyans have retired to bed, I am most likely driving alone in the dead of the night from one function to the other.”
Advances from men, seeking to cash in on her fame, have also been a challenge, especially those who contract her to perform.
Having tried her hands on so many things before settling on singing, her source of strength is the passion that keeps her going.
“Music is easily the best thing I have ever done.” It was an escape from the life of struggles, she says, her face lighting up with satisfaction. Another ogre facing the entire performing industry, is piracy whose merchants, she says, have mastered the art of survival, confusing even the musicians themselves.
Kim says piracy is killing music industry in Kenya and is denying hard-working musicians their deserved decent living.
“These days, pirates will have their albums out competing with the originals in only 24 hours,” she says. They are having a field day in spite of surveillance by the Music Copyright Society of Kenya, the industry monitor.
“My latest album Nissi has been such a great success with playtime and public appreciation so widespread but I have received very little financial benefit.”
The musician made up to Sh80,000 a week from Munjiari album in the first couple of weeks or so before pirates caught up with her. Pirates rob both the artistes and the consumer who is served poor quality music camouflaged in cheaper prices.
While an original CD costs Sh250 at accredited shops, pirates are selling low quality copy at between Sh50 and Sh60.
Kim has bagged a number of awards including the Mwafaka Artist of the Year award; she is now gunning for next month’s Kigooco Senior Artist of the Year Award and the Video of the Year award for her the song Nissi.
Quality work is the hallmark of success in the music industry, she tells budding musicians.
Never too old
A good work must appeal to the consumer when energy and flavour are synchronised to “excite the market.”
“Fixation with money and fortune is root cause of failure.”
In an industry that is littered with one-hit-song artistes, Kim says thinking about money before creating a worthy product “is akin to putting the cart before the horse.”
South African anti-apartheid hero Miriam Makeba is her role model and a testimony that “you never grow too old to sing.” Kim dreams of growth, but has ruled out combining singing with music production.
“It will distract me from what I do well— singing.”
She asks budding singers to choose studios well and not be motivated by the cost while compromising quality.
“The studio could be the difference between a good song and a great song, a critical difference in music.”
