Music is like a football match. Even when the football players do their best, and practice endlessly-sometimes their team loses. Imagine investing in a song, giving it your all, the nice beats and a great message, but it flops and in less than a week, it’s off people’s ears. But why do some songs hit and others not anyway? Clément Ishimwe, the founder and CEO of the KINA Music, says that there are several factors that make a song popular, for instance, the quality of the song. The audience gets excited and yearn to listen to a great song, one that is easy to remember and magical to listen to. Or probably the lyrics are very relatable or basically the nice sound and melody, he added. Ishimwe explains that channeling one’s emotions into the song is also an attribute to a good song. “A good promotion strategy also matters. Artistes should focus on what is trending at that period, and create captivating music. But also make it a point to send that music to blogs, playlists and press outlets,” says Ishimwe. He explains that if it’s possible, the music management can think of investing in public relations or radio campaigns to make the songs circulate as fast as possible. Ishimwe, who has been behind several artistes in Rwanda, is renowned for producing some of the artistes’ that go on to become popular in Rwanda such as Knowless, Dream Boys, Tom Close and others. His latest products, Igor Mabano and Nel Ngabo continue to register successes on the local music scene, while Platini, the other half of what used to be Dream Boys, is also making progress with his solo career under his management. On his part, Bruce Melodie, attributes some of his singles to luck. Having released his song “Saa Moya”, he had no idea it would turn out to be a big deal. He was amazed by how the song boomed. The video went viral and sent “Saa Moya” soaring to the top most played songs on the local TV and radio stations. To this, the singer, however, explains that a song can hit depending on the period it is out- as his “Saa Moya” collided with the curfew time that his fans connected it to the period, yet it is a love song that was even released before curfew time was put at 7pm. Dany Beats, real name Daniel Izero, is of the view that creating a hit song takes a whole team to collaborate, like the producer and the musician communicating about what the idea of the song is. He adds that it’s quite unfortunate that some artistes don’t embrace advices from people, as they think what they know is what would work better, a mindset he says still makes them lag behind. For him, working as a team creates creativity and gives a number of ideas to pick from. Dany Beats says that some songs are not popular or are easily forgotten because they don’t have a target audience. Before writing a song, artistes should think about their audience. “The vibe of the song cannot be taken for granted when it comes to making a hit. I have come to notice that people of all age groups respond positively to the music genre of Afrobeat,” he says. For gospel artiste Liza Kamikazi, sometimes the songs you expect to be popular are not, and the ones you least expected end up successful. She says that some songs are preferred by fans just because they are appealing but not the message behind them. The singer believes that every song has an anointing, if it is a gospel song because as a Christian, she ruminates that there is more to life than what is just seen. To her, the message behind the song can attract people depending on their spiritual lives. Some people might call it fate, but she doesn’t believe in fate or coincidences- everything happens for a reason. “Social media is a powerful tool to promote songs. Imagine if all your friends shared your song on their WhatsApp statuses every after 24 hours or on Instagram. It would be easy for the song to be known,” says DJ Sonia, real name Sonia Kayitesi. Sonia encourages her fellow DJs to support Rwandan musicians by playing their songs in shows and on radio stations.
