George Soulchild – Guest Blog


Here’s George Soulchild’s guest blog for the week. The photo is of an Ngoma Award statuette. I was lucky enough to win one in 2008 for my contribution towards the development of Zambian musicians!

“The National Arts Council of Zambia (NAC) and other stakeholders have started organizing the 14th Ngoma Awards show to take place on December 3 in Lusaka. This year’s theme is ‘Growing the Creative Industry’. The event has more than seven categories – visual arts, creative writing, media arts, music, drama, children’s theatre, traditional dance and theatre comedy – just to mention a few. The creative industry is growing tremendously and this year there will be about 24 awards given to the most deserving artists in the country.

The Ngoma Awards shows started in 1997 and were first held in Lusaka, Zambia. Then they were known as National Honours Awards but in 1998 the name was changed to Ngoma Awards. The first awards show was held at Lusaka Intercontinental Hotel. In the past two years the awards shows were held in Livingstone and Kitwe respectively, in the Southern and Copperbelt provinces of Zambia. The show is held every year to honour Zambian artists who have done exceptional work deserving to be recognised and appreciated.

Alpha Romeo – A new kid on the block
Alpha Romeo is the new kid on the block, his music style is mainly hip-hop sung in Nyanja and he is quite popular with young people. His first single ‘Will’ was released some time late last year. His lyrics are full of social commentary and his most popular song at the moment is ‘’Rumour’’ produced by KB for K-Amy Entertainment. We played this track on the Chanters show as our second local number. Alpha’s14 track album ‘President’ drops next week and is something all hip-hop fans should look out for.
Crystal Shaun – The most underrated artist
Crystal Shaun aka Webster Chilufya has been in the local music industry since the late 90’s when he was still doing his secondary education at Mpika Boys School along with fellow local artistes Runnel and Danny. He dropped his first album in 2004 – it carried the smash hit song “Elina” featuring Runnel produced by TK of Romaside Studio in Lusaka. His follow up album was released under David Sling Studio also based in Lusaka. Crystal Shaun is one of the most underrated artists on the local scene as he’s got so much more to offer. If you take some time to listen to any of his work you’ll agree with me. His style of music is soft raga sung in Bemba and Nyanja. He is currently in the studio cooking up his new sound. On the Chanters’ show we played a song titled ‘’Chimami’’ from his forthcoming album which still untitled.”

Thanks George for your usual entertaining and interesting insight!

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