adminJAH PRAYZAH is one of our leading musical stars.
It will also be fair to say that he is in the top five category of our best musicians.
Sungura ace Alick Macheso also features on that A-list team.
And, so does Winky D.
There is no question that all of them have worked hard to be where they are right now.
Jah Prayzah used to play before between five to 10 fans on Wednesdays at Jazz 105.
Those were the days when Josh Hozheri went out of his way to introduce JP to the capital.
It wasn’t easy because there were times when the patrons at Jazz 105 were not amused to listen, week-in-and-week-out, to an artist they barely knew.
Things got so heated that one day, one of the regular patrons, only referred to as Sekuru Shamhu, asked Hozheri if he could pay JP off so that the band could leave for the sake of tranquillity in the bar.
The point here being that, in those early days, there was an impression among some of the Jazz 105 patrons that JP and his band were just making noise.
That’s the brutality of the music industry but to their credit, both Hozheri and JP didn’t budge and kept their union alive.
Today, thanks in part to that initial exposure and JP’s natural talent and hard work, the lanky artist has become a huge success story.
He has come up with hit after hit and there is serious energy when he is on stage while his music has also spilled beyond our borders.
But, even by his own admission JP will concede that September wasn’t a good month for him.
There was chaos at Belgravia Sports Club where some irate fans pelted the stage with missiles when he was singing.
The anger was generated by what some perceived to have been the late start to his set which tested the patience of some of the fans to the limit.
There was chaos and destruction of property in Gweru at the weekend after JP failed to perform as expected.
The musician and his team have blamed the poor sound quality, which they say would have compromised the quality of their show, for the no-show.
They also cited some questionable actions by the promoters which would have seen them performing way into early Saturday morning when they had been booked to perform on Friday night.
Admittedly, JP is a big artist and time is everything to him given he needs adequate rest, especially given he had another show in Bindura on Saturday.
Our advice is that JP and his team should not blame everything on the promoters but they should start to look at themselves in the mirror.
They might see some images about themselves, which they won’t like but that’s the importance of self-introspection and it pays dividends in the end.
They should ask themselves if, in any way, they have also become a problem to their brand and their actions are now testing their relationship with their fans.
Mathew Masinge
Online Reporter