A band from Star Quest. Photo Credit: Star QuestUnqualified Judges of Star Quest: Nigerian Musical Talent Hunt Show
They are not professionals, they are inexperienced and most of them are not even well groomed musically.
How many of them can play musical instruments satisfactorily or defend the music in their albums?
Musical judges should be resource persons drawn from reputable music institutions, industry professionals who know their onions and music instructors with results.
~ Akapo Emmanuel in “Will real Stars be produced” on Star Quest, page 47 of the Viewpoint in Sunday Vanguard on March 28, 2010.
Nigerian Breweries Plc has been spending a lot on Star Quest to promote Nigerian music by encouraging the revival of music bands. But there is a problem. The judges on Star Quest have been making mockery of themselves while thinking they are making fun of the contestants they are judging, because from my knowledge of music since my secondary school days at the famous St.Gregory’s College in Lagos, where good bands such as the famous Ofege, New Generation and others have emerged, I can tell you that these judges have little or no proven knowledge of MUSIC in rudiments and in instruction.
It is erroneous to make Hip-hop artistes who in most cases are music illiterates (those who cannot read and write music) judges.
They are not simply qualified to judge music.
A performer from Star Quest . Photo Credit: Star QuestMost of these so called celebrated hip hop superstars in Nigeria will not even pass auditions for recording contracts in the US or Europe where music production is not faked by DJs and amateurish sound engineers who dub the sound tracks of American and European musicians and mix them for Nigerian hip hop wannabes to rap or sing over them and these voice over artistes are recorded and released on the streets and bribing radio DJs and TV video jockeys to give them constant airplay (rotation) to hype them on their stage-managed charts. They spend a lot of money to fake or make musical videos copied from American and European videos and using sexploitation to market themselves as stars, but most of them cannot even sing. What we see are Garbage In, Garbage Out (GIGO) hip hop artistes unleashing their mediocrity on us. They even pay bootleggers to pirate their own music in what they popularly call Alaba Mix in local parlance in Nigeria. Then show organizers use them to promote and market alcoholic products and other junk products targeted at the ignorant and vulnerable youths in Nigeria who are now calling themselves the Hip-hop generation. And they have no shame to boast of this sham!
Please, read Our Music Is Dying Slowly, And Still Smiling by Femi Akintunde-Johnson, and Akapo Emmanuel’s critical analysis of the judges is worth reading by the organizers and the viewers.
~ By Ekenyerengozi Michael Chima
