Creative Industry: Gospel artiste hails appointment of Asika, Nuhu
Gospel Artist, Rev. Fr. Benedict Onyemechalu, best known as FadaBen has commended President Bola Tinubu for appointing talented, young professionals as chief executive officers for federal government’s agencies in the culture and creative sector.
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The Catholic Priest and Musician gave the commendation in an interview with the Newsreporters on Sunday in Abuja.
FadaBen particularly hailed the appointment of Obi Asika as Director-General, National Council for Arts and Culture; and Ali Nuhu, Managing-Director, Nigerian Film Corporation, both under the Federal Ministry of Arts, Culture and Creative Economy.
Asika, 55, is acknowledged as one of the pioneers and leaders of the Nigerian music revolution while Nuhu, 49, is a veteran Nollywood and Kannywood actor and producer.
“Obi Asika and Ali Nuhu can best be described as a round peg in a round hole
“They have done so well for themselves in their respective fields of music and film, and a whole lot of young people repose great confidence in them.
“On the whole, I think that because they are young and fulfilled, they’ll surely know how to make the right impact.
“This is different from when you have old people, men and women, fill up positions that we think younger persons can do better at,” he said.
The gospel artist fondly remembered his encounter with Asika in 2022 when he (FadaBen) was running a programme on music business for Africa.
He said the programme was curated by Mr Godwin Tom, the current Managing Director, Sony Music Publishing, Nigéria.
“I must say that it was a life-changing one for me and many others. During this programme, we had interactions with Mr Asika”
Reacting to a recurrent trend of fusion in secular and gospel in the music industry, FadaBen said it was a welcomed development and he envisaged collaboration between artists in the two categories
“It is a welcomed development to see gospel-secular music fusion. My analysis of the whole trend builds on the fact that both genres of music seek validation from each other.
“We have the secular music and musicians seeking validations from gospel enterprises; this finds expression innocently in the music vibes and style of Asake, Spyro, Johnny Drille, and a few others.
“On the other hand, we have gospel music and musicians also seeking validation from the secular music world.
“This is evident in the works of people like Moses Bliss, Ebuka Songs and a couple of others.
“At the end, we might end up seeing future collaborations between secular musicians and their gospel counterparts,” he said.
FadaBen stressed that, gospel or secular, people love to listen and connect to good music, with great lyrics and attendant messages
The clergy and musician said he is influenced by the works of notable Nigerian choral musicians like Prof. Laz. Ekwueme, Sir Sam Ojukwu and Sir Jude Nnam.
He added that he looked up to musicians like Moses Abdulkass, loved the works of Nathaniel Bassey and finesse acts like Johnny Drille.
NAN/S.S
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