adminabout gospel music is that it is centred on Christ who is the object of all manner of worship and less about human praise or competition among artistes.
Recently some sections of the media reported that one of Zimbabwe’s rising gospel musicians, Blessing Shumba was locked in a bitter dispute with another budding gospel musician Mathias Mhere, who is believed to have copied Shumba’s style of music.
Stories of this nature make interesting reading because gospel artistes are believed to be models of good behaviour and cannot be seen fighting over rights to ownership of any particular style of music.
I believe Shumba demonstrated maturity by dispelling rumours of a dispute or fight between himself and Mhere over allegations that the young artiste copied his style of music.
Speaking in an interview, Shumba who is also a pastor said he was not angry with Mhere and added that the fact that the young musician was singing gospel music was good for the gospel.
“There is nothing bad and I have no beef with the musician. This is what we want in the music industry.
“I am not angry at all. The ministry needs to grow and we need more musicians to preach the gospel to all corners of the earth,” said Shumba.
Mhere, on the other hand, was reported to have denied copying Shumba’s style of music and also said his and Shumba’s music sounded similar because they shared the same music producer, Lyton Ngolombi.
Personally, I took time to listen to Mhere’s music on his album “Anoita Minana” released in November last year and I noticed that his music can easily be mistaken for Shumba’s.
To put it simply, the artiste’s music lacks originality in terms of vocal sound and style of music, but that said there is an element of uniqueness in the way Mhere arranges his lyrics.
Some of the tracks such “Favour” and “Vaporofita Venhema” are easy to interpret whether one is well versed in the Scriptures or not.
The song “Vaporofita Venhema”, for example, reflects on our modern society where numerous churches have mushroomed across the country and to top it all, many self-proclaimed prophets claim to possess spiritual powers that help them make prophesies that apply to people’s lives individually or collectively as a church or nation.
The song “Favour”, which has literaly been transformed into an anthem among music consumers, reflects the type of material and spiritual blessings people receive from God and how these blessings make life bearable for them.
The idea of God’s favour is a subject of study in theological circles as it refers to unusual or unique blessings received only by believers when they please God.
Looking at Mhere in general as a budding gospel musician, there is no doubt that he has a promising career in gospel music thanks to his ability to write his own songs.
Whether or not he copied Shumba’s music should be up to the listener, but in the interest of preaching the gospel, I think the artiste is doing a good job by preaching the Word through music.
Instead of labelling them as copycats, I think it’s advisable to encourage young musicians such as Mhere to carry on with gospel music, but at the same time, music producers should be more creative by producing different styles of music for different artistes.
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Online Reporter