Gramma to introduce MP3s

and DVDs” by Gramma and Last Power recording companies, that are being sold at a US$1 — the same price as the pirated copies on the streets.
In an interview, Gramma Records general manager Emmanuel Vhori said the move was aimed at reducing the levels of piracy of their products.
“Recording companies are prepared to give it all, to extinguish the flames of piracy that had literary turned musicians into destitutes,” he said.
With such a development there is no doubt that pirates will be pushed out of business because more people will now either buy original budget CD or MP3s.
“It has dawned to us now that we need to be on top of the game as we deal with the pirates and should be able to give to the listener what the pirates are giving, or even much more.”

He added that the decision to slash the price of CDs was now yielding positive results, a development they hoped will cascade to MP3s.
“We made consultations and considerations and realised that if we have been able to sell an artiste’s original CD with six tracks at US$1, it can still work for us.
“In the case of an MP3, it will carry 100 songs from the same musician and going for the same price, which would be more appealing to the buyer.”

He added that the MP3s will be out soon once they have finished working on the modalities.
“We are looking into contracts that we hold with musicians to see if it is possible to do that because as you are aware that some artistes have since moved to other stables while others have actually started their own record labels.

“We have engaged the bulk of our artistes and they are in agreement with the idea, although there are some few loose ends we need to tie up and we will be offering MP3s and CDs with a wide range of music.”
Mr Vhori said the best way to fight the cancerous piracy was to give music lovers what they are getting on the black market.

“We will be moving with technological trends and make it possible for everyone to access their favourite music on the Internet, on flash disks, on memory sticks and even buying a brand new phone with local music uploaded on it already,” he said.
He added that at the end of the day what was important was to make sure that the artiste gets what is due to him or her and those that were in the business of producing music and distributing it remained afloat.

The fight against piracy has — as expected — met its fair share of challenges.
Some musicians have refused to have their music sold for a dollar, arguing that it would degrade them.
There are also some retailers who are refusing to sell the budget CDs.

“This has given us some challenges but we are working around these issues.
“We are happy that the majority of the musicians we hold rights to distribute their music have agreed on the initiative, including big artistes like Alick Macheso, Nicholas Zakaria, Gift Amuli and many others.”

In the event that an artiste passes on, the recording company will approach the family so that they can reach an agreement.
A number of musicians have been hard hit by piracy and some have resorted to moving around selling their own CDs for the same price as pirated copies.

Recently, Kudzi Nyakudya was arrested in Harare after he was found selling his own CDs. The matter only came to rest after his recording company, Diamond Studios, withdrew the charges against him.
In an interview, the firebrand gospel artiste pleaded guilty to the offence, saying that he needed to survive, since his recording company had dismally failed to adequately market his music.