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Flashmag September 2020 www.flashmag.net
Yes, there is a loss of visibility and that is why we are not often programmed at festivals. The investment is huge and it is not easy.
My question is more about federating, because the medias are made by the audience that supports them. Isn’t it time, for Africans to create their medias, that should be supported by Africans so that the profits can be reinvested in culture, and that Africans and Caribbean begin to behave as intelligent consumers by consuming the products of their own kind?
I still think that when it comes to urban music, Africans consume their music, there is a certain dynamic that is there, even if I do not fully subscribe to everything that is done. They are creating an economy. I recently spoke with Charlotte Dipanda on the subject. Despite the limited means, she managed to build herself.
You've produced a plethora of artists in general what drives you to produce an artist you walk by feeling or by business first?
It’s always the artistic side that comes first when I produce; whether it is musicians or dancers because I also produce for dance troupes. It's a collaboration, an exchange and I love it. Two or three we are always stronger, than all alone. Afterwards, even if it is sometimes end up being funded by other structures, the idea is much more to invest in creation first.
Since 2004, you have flirted with the solo scene, under your lifelong nickname Wambo. Why did you feel the need to go solo?
It’s true after having accompanied and produced several artists as I explained above. At one point I said to myself, here are the forties coming, something else must be done. So, I wrote songs, I didn't dare to attack French too much because it's a complicated language. I went backwards but at the same time with the story of "C’est la vie" I realized that it also worked because it was in French. French brought together more people. This is true today with urban music. As I do not speak Bamiléké (Editor's note: languages spoken in western Cameroon) it was a bit complicated. I made my first album and I also invited Pablo Master who does more Ragga music, Charlotte Dipanda, Cathy Renoir, and Henri Dikongué for a song about friendship because some people thought we were on bad terms, since we no longer worked together.
You had a stint in the United States with the group "Voices" between 2005 and 2011 if you had to say a
Samuel Nja Kwa
On Stage With singer Charlotte Dipanda