The harmony is encouraging

Not long ago, the music industry appeared threatened to be torn by silentl warfares that were mainly being fanned by ‘camps’ on social media.

These ‘camps’, were mainly a legion of followers of particular artists who never missed an opportunity to pit artist A against artist B in senseless contests. Unfortunately, some artists got carried away by this negative vibe and one could get a feeling that they really wanted to escalate these useless battles.

The occasional undertones from some of the artists involved became worrying. One could see the worrying trend erode the credibility within the industry. Those who were behind it were clearly enjoying while the reasonable heads knew the industry was headed for disaster if that negative vibe were to be sustained for a period.

A number of seasoned practitioners spoke about it. I remember contemporary legendary artist ‘Soldier’ Lucius Banda as one individual who never let an opportunity pass by without speaking against the vice.

Music is an art which needs to be enjoyed wholesale. One can never restrict themselves to one artist while creating boundaries against others. Even in the variation of tastes and preferences, one doesn’t need to cast out others as garbage.

Luckily, that bad wind did not blow for long. The agitators of the negative energy eventually run out of steam and peace and sanity prevailed at last. And as time went what we have seen is a serious turnaround in the inter-relations of local artists.

Nowadays, when one artist has an event, you can see serious elements of oneness in the way they support each other. I remember during the launch of Piksy’s latest album at Comesa Hall in Blantyre.

The way his fellow artists came from far and wide to support his launch was amazing. One could sense a feeling of wanting to stand up for each other and achieve a common good. Even through messages of support on social media, the support was simply overwhelming.

Months later, I saw the same during Lawi’s album launch at Sunbird Mount Soche in Blantyre. His fellow artists stood right in his corner to offer him the moral support.

I can cite more cases, but the recent one in Mzuzu last weekend during Gwamba’s Unlimited Concert at Mzuzu Stadium was another act of immense love and oneness. For a week, Gwamba was in Mzuzu with a group of his artist friends promoting the show.

They carried out different initiatives to drum up the vibe of the concert as a group. And on the day of the event itself, it appeared like it was a whole festival where everyone had to sing. Almost every name in the music industry was present, not to perform, but just for support.

The local music industry is already naturally limited by many factors, the lean economy being chief among them. The worst thing that can happen is to have its players take routes that further diminish the potential the industry has.

If we are serious about taking the industry to another level, it is time we started leveraging on some of the key things such as collaborations and all that. A fraternity which is riddled with useless spats and bickering cannot achieve any meaningful collaborations.

We are stronger and better when we stand together and poorer when we go it alone. The pictures we saw from Mzuzu Stadium are what things are supposed to be like. The responsibility to lift the industry doesn’t fall on individual shoulders, but in every participant.