REVELERS are still talking about the ‘Tay C Live in Kigali’ concert but some local artists on the lineup are yet to come to terms with the fact that they missed out on a chance to perform, in what they described as lack of respect from Intore Entertainment, the concert organiser. People described the French performance as the show of the year but, behind the curtains, artistes call it one of their worst nights they have ever gone through in their music career. The likes of Nel Ngabo, Kevin Kade and DJ Pius missed out on the stage last minute, despite spending days and nights rehearsing. Singer Nel Ngabo and his band were denied a chance to perform live at the ‘TayC Live in Kigali’ concert. “You can’t imagine how disappointed Nel is,” Clement Ishimwe told The New Times as he expressed his frustration about how organisers asked Nel Ngabo to do ‘playback’ when the singer and his band were readying to do a live performance which they have been rehearsing for over a week. “He was told to do playback because they had no time and wanted to remove the backline from the stage so that it doesn’t look bad for Tay C when he performs because he was going to do playback,” the Kina Music boss said. Ishimwe tried to push for his boy to perform live because he believed it was a good test for the music prodigy to prove his worth before over 9, 000 revelers at the venue but organisers insisted that time only allowed playback. The decision did not go well with Ishimwe who described the organisers as ‘disrespectful’. He objected to Nel and his band playing playback and they instead left the venue without performing. “Imagine Nel’s band was on stage already when they actually disconnected and removed their instruments from the stage. This has to end and everyone needs to talk about this, it’s ridiculous,” he said. “Everyone involved in this…artistes, media have to talk about it. Artistes especially have to refuse to be disrespected and say the truth about how they are treated because most of them are not brave enough to denounce it,” he added. Of all local artistes who were on the ‘Tay C in Kigali’ concert lineup, only Christopher was allowed to do live performance as planned while Joel Ruti only did acapella for one song. Besides Nel Ngabo, DJ Pius and Kevin Kade also refused to do playback performance and chose to leave the venue after tens of minutes fighting to perform live in vain. “I did rehearsals for live music but they wanted me to do playback. I was not made to do playback performances,” Kade told The New Times. Time factor There have been claims that local concert organisers, including Bruce Intore whose company, Intore Entertainment brought Tay C to Kigali, are taking Rwandan music a step back by organising concerts that involve playback performances, as pointed out by music pioneer Might Popo, the man behind Nyundo School of Arts and Music. The school encourages its music students to perform live music even after they graduate from the school. Kevin Kade is one of the musicians who graduated at the school and his loyalty to live music made him to reject organisers’ plea to do playback during Saturday’s concert. However, Intore told The New Times that playback was not mandatory for local artistes but the only option to save time for the man of the show Tay C. He explained that there was no time for live performances because the artistes, except Christopher and Nel Ngabo, arrived later than their performances were scheduled because they wanted to avoid performing in the early hours of the concert. “Who are we to refuse those artists to do live performances yet we were the ones who approached them to perform at our concert?” argued Intore. “You can’t say that they were forced to perform playback yet Christopher, who performed last among local artists, sang live. We understand how bad they feel about missing out on the stage and we also regret hearing it happening to our artists but that’s what happens when you don’t perform on your scheduled time,” he added. Intore clarified that doing playback was the only option to both save time for the main headliner and conclude the concert at the given time as agreed with the venue management. According to Intore, the band that was supposed to back the artistes was not at the venue until 9pm. He and his team mutually suggested that the artistes perform playback to save time for the main headliner or they would leave without performing. Kivumbi and Kenny K-Shot did playback but Kevin Kade, DJ Pius and Nel Ngabo’s management refused. “The only artiste I feel sorry for is Nel Ngabo because his band was around but he couldn’t perform live because it was almost time for Tay C to take over the stage,” he said. Local artistes have on many occasions claimed that they arent given the treatment and respect they deserve from event planners who they accuse of undermining them in front of international performers yet they should be the ones to protect them and introduce them to the international audience. In February, drill musician Ish Kevin disconnected the sound system after his performance was cut short to pave way for Nigerian singer AV, a move that led to a huge saga at the concert. The fast-rising artiste and his gang did not seem impressed by the DJ’s action, stating that Rwandan musicians should also be respected like others. Ish Kevin refused to leave the stage until he was given more time to perform.
