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1 Dancing through the Crisis: Survival Dynamics and Zimbabwe Music Industry* Nhamo Anthony Mhiripiri The details of how Zimbabwe – once lauded as the jewel of Africa – slid into a mess over the past decade have been well chronicled (see Melber 2004; HaroldBerry 2004; Vambe 2008). President Robert Mugabe and his ruling ZANU PF blame the economic meltdown on the British and their allies the United States of America, Australia and the European Union, who are vindictive over the fasttrack land reform programme that forcibly wrests land from white farmers. Mugabe’s critics blame corruption, dictatorship, gross disrespect for the rule of law and no protection of private property, jeopardizing productivity and foreign currency earnings through the land reform programmes, and the abuse of human rights as the main causes of the country’s problems (Mhiripiri 2008). At a time of very serious political and economic crisis, Zimbabweans seem to be entertaining themselves with music. There has been a massive shut-down of manufacturing industries, but the music industry remains resilient. According to the country’s Central Statistics Office, inflation is the highest in the world, reaching as high as 100,000 per cent by mid February 2008, even exceeding that of war-ravaged Iraq, which is second highest at 60 per cent. Zimbabwe’s crisis has created paradoxes such as poor billionaires and the fastest-shrinking economy outside of a war zone. Unemployment in formal jobs was as high as 80 per cent in January 2008. Despite all this, the music industry looks vibrant, and shows no signs that the big recording companies – Zimbabwe Music Corporation (ZMC), Records and Tape Promotions (RTP), Gramma and Ngaavongwe – will shut down or relocate to South Africa as most other companies have done. In the Zimbabwe case, the political economy of the music industry is of special interest because, prima facie, it seems as if there is nothing particularly ‘political’ about the music produced. The main musicians hardly sing any scathing political Contemporary African Cultural Productions 2 content, and there is no banning of music shows for political reasons. It is worthwhile to investigate how the different stakeholders in the music industry sustain audiences’ and buyers’ interest, given that Zimbabwe is arguably one African country where local really is ‘lekker,’ with more local records selling compared to foreign productions. Socio-economic and political dynamics and marketing techniques are crucial in ascertaining the survival and growth of the Zimbabwe music industry. There exist both strong and tenuous links between the Zimbabwe music industry and South African and global music production, distribution and consumption systems, especially now that there are millions of Zimbabweans in the Diaspora. These links are important in evaluating the artistic productions of Zimbabwean musicians and what they derive from the industry. The Zimbabwean music industry has produced its own stars across different genres and styles. Star names abound in the genres of sungura, mbira, gospel, acapella, jazz, Urban Grooves, etc. It is important to investigate whether the local star system is generally helpful to the quality of lives of the majority of musicians. All types of music have been commodified and are aggressively marketed (Chitando 2002; Brusila 2002:35-45; Connell and Gibson 2003; Jenje-Makwenda 2005; Chari 2007; Souza 2007). Inventive marketing techniques that are largely informal are used to attract audiences and persuade consumers to expend their hard-won cash on entertainment. Zimbabwean musicians perform several live shows each week, with the big names drawing as many as 10,000 people on exceptional shows. Bands and fans contribute to a local scene; the local music dissemination infrastructure includes churches, beer halls and concert halls in low-income, highdensity population areas, and elegant clubs and hotel auditoriums. Recorded local music has a competitive advantage over foreign music, which is hardly imported due to foreign currency limitations and the absence of international distribution networks. With limited choice, local music sells rapidly, and the sungura music genre sells best. The Zimbabwe Recording Industry The concepts of ‘majors’ and ‘Indies’ adopted from the American music scene since the 1970s, where ‘majors’1 are large companies with substantial capital and power, and ‘Indies’ are small independent labels operating in marginal markets, are to some extent applicable to the Zimbabwean music industry (Starr and Waterman 2003:9; Mhiripiri 2004). The majors often play a ‘conservative’ role, ‘seeking to ensure profits by producing predictable music for a large middle-class audience’, but occasionally cautiously adopting new genres, artists and styles, especially those identified by the ‘Indies’ to...

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