Programme Director
The MEC for Arts, Culture, Sports and Recreation MEC Thusi
The CEO of KZN Music House, Mr Mbongeni Ngema
Dignitaries Present
Ladies and gentlemen
All protocol observed
It gives us pleasure as the Ministry of Economic Development and Tourism to be part of this auspicious occasion where we are meeting to celebrate a milestone for an institution which is at the cutting edge of promoting musical excellence and the exploitation of other related economic opportunities offered by our cultural heritage in our province.
From the onset, Programme Director, we wish to acknowledge the presence of our special guests, Banyana Banyana who are playing tomorrow in what we hope will be a mouth-watering encounter. We have no doubt that come tomorrow; just like Bafana Bafana they will make us proud and fly the national flag aloft.
We also wish to thank the South African Football Association for bringing this humdinger of a clash to KwaZulu-Natal for we think this augurs well for our quest to promote sporting tourism. It has become a national belief that sporting activities do serve as an essential ingredient to foster a sense of unity and patriotism amongst our diverse communities as we have witnessed this in the previous mega sporting events such as the recent 2010 FIFA World Cup and the 1995 Rugby World Cup and 1996 African Nations Cup.
Programme Director the first anniversary is a special occasion in the life of any institution. In a life of a human being, the first birthday celebration is a time of immense joy for the parents as it the time when the baby begins to take its first step, shrugging off the fears of falling and face the world with confidence.
As we gather here tonight we are equally ecstatic about the milestone that has been reached by the KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) Music House, for this institution has not only shrug off the fears of falling but it has hit the ground running and stroke the right chord to build a sound foundation in its first year of existence.
Programme Director, a day like this is not a day of long speeches but it is a day when we all have to let our hair down in celebration. But we believe that it would be remiss of us not to touch on why government decided to build an institution of this kind in the province of KwaZulu-Natal. As many of you are aware, our province has always distinguished itself as a cradle of musical excellence from time immemorial whether it is mbaqanga, maskandi music or any other genre.
However the sad reality is that our province is yet to fully exploit the economic benefits that accrue out of this industry. As many of you are aware, many artists from KwaZulu-Natal , who have gone on the set the world musical stage on fire, have had to over the years pack their bags and travel to Johannesburg to realise their dream.
It goes without saying that it is Gauteng that has been reaping the fruits of their success, because until recently it was Gauteng which had the state of the art recording facilities. It is because of this reason that as government we took a bold decision and invested in this facility which we believe is beginning to yield the desired results for the province of KwaZulu-Natal. Today we are therefore toasting the success of a vision which has come into fruition. For this we are eternally grateful to my predecessor and our Honourable Premier, Dr Zweli Mkhize who started this institution.
Programme Director, in order to appreciate the contribution of music to the economic landscape of our country you only have to look at the value of the music industry in South Africa.
According to the Department of Arts and Culture, the South African music industry is worth approximately R974.7 million. This figure is composed of:
- Album sales at wholesale costs - R585,8 million
- Performance copyright revenues - R86,3 million
- Mechanical copyright revenues - R86.3 million
- Retail - R146,3 million
- Sound and lighting - R70 million
This figure pales out in comparison with the contribution of music to the global economy. This shows that our investment into this facility was a well thought out decision which will bring benefits to the province of KwaZulu-Natal.
As all of us know, the music industry itself is facing a number of challenges, chief among them the issue of piracy and limited resources for the development and promotion of South African artists. This is exacerbated by lack of a coordinated strategy for the development of the industry. In this age of globalisation, we believe that our province can benefit a lot if we can tap into music as one of our key cultural exports.
The research that we have done indicates that the industry is controlled and monopolised by a few major international players. These powerhouses control and own the entire music value chain from recording to retail shelf space. This practice is called vertical integration which locks competitors outside and sell only a certain quota of music from other recording stables.
KZN Music house aims to break these boundaries and allow new, up and coming artists to have access to the music recording facilities and find retail shelf space deemed difficult to reach.
The music major companies who control vast areas of the value chain, both globallyand in South Africa have therefore created a situation in which horizontal integration, which is integration between record companies, have increasingly become a challenging feature within the music industry.
This trend duly affects new artists that have never recorded before, and unknown artists that have not received good publicity for their music. It is in light of these circumstances that KZN Music House has come up with innovative ways to introduce the new talent into the mainstream economic activity of the music industry through its various programs.
KZN Music House has initiated a talent search program that has groomed and developed raw talent from the streets and recorded them. To this end, a total of 755 artists have attended KZN Music House artist developmental program for new talent search similar to the famous Pop Idols called Vezikhono Talent search. These artists were from music genres that ranged from Gospel, Maskandi, Hip-hop, and Kwaito.
This activity has therefore resulted in the identification, auditioning, and recording of more than 26 artists from the program.
This number excludes other 22 artists that have been successfully recorded by KZN Music House which includes eight well renowned artists and 14 novice artists that were derived from demo listening sessions. Since this facility started operating we have recorded at least 80 artists. This number also includes 32 artists that have booked the studio privately which are not part of the institution’s developmental programs. Apart from recording local music acts, KZN Music House studios have attracted artists from as far afield as UK and from other provinces. It goes without saying that this is good for our provincial economy.
As we celebrate this milestone, one of the issues which is at the summit of our agenda is to equip artists with knowledge about intellectual property rights, law of contract and business management. We all know that history is littered with a number of cases where our artists have been fleeced by unscrupulous recording companies -owing to the fact that they had tied themselves to contracts they did not understand. It’s essential that artists do see themselves as business operatives than just entertainers who live at the whims of their production companies.
Lastly, Programme Director, our government has committed itself to work doubly harder to create jobs in our country. We believe that the music industry and the arts sector in general is one of the sectors that can play a critical role in creating jobs in for many of our people.
In conclusion, we wish the KZN Music House well as it celebrates this milestone. We have no doubt that what you have achieved over the past twelve months is an omen for greater accomplishments that you will notch going into the future.
I thank you
Source: KwaZulu-Natal Department of Economic Development and Tourism
