In the groove: Major League disappointed Harare fans

By Fred Zindi

When I was in secondary school, one of my English Literature text books was William Shakespeare’s comedy titled Twelfth Night. What captivated me most about this book was the opening line, which read:

If music be the food of love, play on. Here Shakespeare asks for more music because he muses that an excess of music might cure his obsession with love, in the way that eating too much removes one’s appetite for food.

Just recently at a sold out Major League concert, young lovers who had come to remove their appetite for  music after 19 months of non-activity in this sphere due to the Covid-19 pandemic, failed to get satisfaction.

Prominent South African music duo, Major League DJz  were  scheduled to give a performance in Harare’s leafy surburb of Borrowdale at Palm Estate in Stonechat Lane, but it never happened. Police arrived shortly after upcoming hip-hop musician, King 98 got off stage and blocked the amapiano musos headline performance, thus closing down the event.

This disappointed revellers who had come to drown their souls into music after enduring 19 months of musical drought. Many are wondering why they were made to pay ticket prices, which ranged from US$20 to US$200 for a show that never took place. They also want to know if they are going to get refunds from the organisers of the show.

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The Major League twin brothers, Bandile and Banele Mbere,  were expected to perform at the  concert dubbed The City Shutdown.

Speculation as to the reasons behind this shut down is rife. Some people say that the Borrowdale neighbours complained that a major concert of that magnitude should have not been allowed to take place in their neighbourhood without them being consulted as it allowed congestion of the street and noise in the suburb.

Others say that some of the people who were being allowed into the concert violated the Covid-19 restrictions as they were not fully vaccinated and nobody was checking on this requirement.

There are still others who say that the police did not want these organisers to go beyond the stipulated 10 o’clock curfew time, so their action.

One reveller,  Katiba Nkomo Yengwayo,  says:

“May be a big musician got jealous and instructed his police friends to go shutdown the event.”

One Johannes Kativu commented: “These organisers are amateurs. If Chipaz, Biggie Chinoperekwei or Two Kings’ Tich Mharadze had organised this, they would have simply bribed the few policemen who were there with $100 and the concert in Harare would have gone ahead.”

However, the Major League’s show in Bulawayo went ahead as planned the next day at “The Smokehouse” as the twins brought the house down with their performance there.

Nobody seems to know the real reason behind the shut down in Harare, but the twin brothers promised Zimbabweans that they will come back next month for a free performance as a token of appreciation and to make it up to their Harare fans.

How they are going to do this is beyond me as they are not the promoters. It costs air tickets to get them on the plane. It costs money to find a suitable venue and to hire a PA system.  Is this mere talk?  We will wait and see.

I spoke to Nicholas Moyo, the director of the National Arts Council of Zimbabwe (NACZ) to find out if the organisers of the concert had been cleared for the event.  At the time  Moyo had not even heard of the Harare cancellation. He said that the organisers had not renewed their promoters’ licence when they started planning this event, but by Saturday October 30, their papers were in order and “we agreed to let them approach Zimra”.

“We also wondered if Palm Estate was the best venue for the event.  With Covid-19 restrictions, ZRP conditions also had to be followed as they did not want the revellers to violate other provisions,” Moyo said.

Efforts to speak to DJ Rimo, aka Tinotenda Marimo and his partner, Collin, two of the organisers of the Major League concert did not bear much fruit.

Last Monday DJ Rimo stated that he was at the airport busy getting the guys on the plane back to South Africa and did not have time to talk to me. When I spoke to Collin, he said: “You know there was a problem, so right now I can’t comment”.

That is all the comments I got from the organisers of the concert. When such promotion goes wrong, shouldn’t they employ someone to answer questions and deal with an angry public?  So much for public relations. No wonder why music promoters are not taken seriously.

My niece, who had paid US$100 to attend the concert is very angry: “Everything just went silent.

“We just saw the police standing on the stage. No announcement was made. We were not told to go home. We just kept wondering about what was taking place until after about 30 minutes when people decided to go home. Up to now we don’t know if we are going to get refunds or be informed when the next concert will be. These people we had come to see are from South Africa. I doubt if they will come back. All I am left with is a wrist band which was put around my arm after I paid the US$100. That’s daylight robbery”, she said.

This is not the first time concerts have been shut down in Zimbabwe. Towards Christmas last year, a similar incident took place at the Harare International Conference Centre.

After the 11th hour cancellation of the Best of Both Worlds Concert (BBW) where Jah Prayzah and Winky D, were billed to “face-off” and which was also scheduled for live streaming, the event was shut down.

Organisers of the concert, Kayse Connect and Gateway Stream Music, said that they had decided to cancel the show at the last hour due to “time constraints”.

They did not blame the police, other promoters or politicians for the cancellation. After planning this for weeks, which I assume included getting the pre-requisite clearance from both the police and the NACZ, booking the venue, rigging the music equipment onto the stage, advertising on all forms of media and selling tickets, this explanation does not seem to make sense to me.

The event was postponed at the 11th hour leaving music lovers, some who were already at the venue and those who had bought tickets for the live event, to watch online through pay-per-view, disgruntled.

Kayse Connect representative Elton Kurima apologised for the last minute cancellation and assured music lovers that the event would be held at a later date. He said that they cancelled the show because of time-constraints due to lockdown protocols. But were they not aware of these restrictions beforehand when planning this concert? I wonder.

Whatever the reason, there is no doubt in my mind that a great deal of money was lost in the process and I would not be surprised if these organisers Kayse Connect and Gateway Stream Music,  fail to resurface. Up to now, the event has still not been re-scheduled neither did the fans get their refunds.

In the case of last week’s cancellation, angry fans could have rioted or clashed with the police who were seen to be at the scene to enforce the shut down. Fortunately this did not happen. Instead, a few music fans threw stones at the promoters’ black Range Rover which was parked on Stonechat Lane.

Music promotion needs experienced people. It is not a fly-by-night activity where anyone who thinks they can make money by calling a popular artiste to perform can win the game without much thought put into it.

What I’ve seen from people who have left the  music promotion “business” behind is that they are generally much happier. Granted, it’s not an easy decision to make.

We have so much of our self-image invested in the romantic mythology that swirls around music promotion, and that mythology includes the idea that a “day job” is a cop-out, the kiss of death, not something that a  serious promoter would ever do.

Hopwever, it seems to me that if a creative and artistically independent life is the goal, then the solution, in an era of Covid-19, dwindling government support to the arts industry, economic meltdown and an apathetic public, is to plan it carefully and finance it with other productive work instead of music promotion.

• Feedback: frezindi@gmail.com