- Title: Youth from Nigerian slum take on country’s music scene
- Date: 1st May 2019
- Summary: VARIOUS OF NNAMANI SINGING
- Embargoed: 15th May 2019 09:05
- Keywords: Nigerian musicians young musicians Nigerian slums Afrobeat "Leg Work" Oturkpo Got Talent Nollywood Zanku
- Location: LAGOS AND BENUE, NIGERIA
- City: LAGOS AND BENUE, NIGERIA
- Country: Nigeria
- Topics: Arts / Culture / Entertainment,Music
- Reuters ID: LVA008AD2IC7R
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Dickson Adire and fellow musician James Nnamani are on a radio show in Nigeria's commercial capital Lagos today, to promote their music.
The young musicians aged 17 and 13 respectively are a new singing sensations in the country, after being discovered on a local talent show.
Adire whose stage name is AOD, is best known for his music single, "Leg Work" which has been playing on airwaves lately and is also available on major online music stores.
The 3-minute Arobeat song is typically performed while doing the "Zanku", a dance step that went viral in Nigeria in 2017.
The two artists who both grew up in a teeming shanty town in Nigeria's central Benue State, are building solo careers but occasionally create music music together.
Adire says it has taken a while for his work to get noticed but he never gave up trying.
"I feel very happy, I feel like it is a dream come true, I thank God for everything. My music is being heard in almost every radio station in Nigeria and I am very happy. It is like a dream come true, I thank God," he said.
Nigerian filmmaker and producer, Pascal Atuma is working to help the boys build their brands.
He decided to start his label, Tabic Records to help nurture talent in poor communities, where youth hardly get opportunities to thrive, after watching Nnamani and Adire take part on local talent show, "Oturkpo Got Talent" in 2017.
"The motivation is the talent that I saw in Oturkpo when I went to direct Oturkpo Got Talent, I saw that these two kids where so talented and I could not pass on them, so I decided because of them to launch a record label to help the less privileged and those in the communities, in the society in Nigeria and all the rest of Africa," said Atuma.
Much like the famous "Nollywood" film industry, music is now big business in Africa's most populous nation.
The music industry's revenue from music sales were US$56 million in 2015 and are forecast to grow to US$88 million in 2019, according to auditing firm Pricewaterhouse Coopers (PwC).
Artists who sing and rap over electronic backing tracks, in a genre known as Afrobeat, have seen their popularity in Nigeria spill over into record sales and sold-out concerts across Africa and in both Britain and the United States.
The artists plan to take advantage of the growing music to establish their careers.
They often get together with friends and hold jam sessions - composing songs and using improvised instruments, as they entertain neighbours.
Nnamani and Adire use any opportunity they can find to record songs, hoping this will open doors for them in future.
"I have always loved music; I started music at the age of 10. I used my mommy's spoon, I played instrumentals and I rap to it. Sometimes I sing to it and I always go for competitions. At the age of 10, 11, 12 and 13. But I got my breakthrough at the age of 14," said Nnamani.
"We were a group of six friends so all of them can do music but I can't, so they were like making fun of me that I can't sing so I just went home, picked one of their rhymes and out of it I wrote mine. I came to class and I did it for them and they said we should go and record it," said Adire.
Nnamani who lost his father in 2015 and lives in a two-room house with his mother, siblings and grandmother. He says he wants to establish a solid career doing what he loves and that will help improve their living conditions.
(Angela Ukomadu, Donna Omulo, Seun Sanni) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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