The Sunday News
Lance Chigodo, Sunday Leisure Reporter
AN ASSORTMENT of established and upcoming Zim dancehall artistes will be performing at the Zim dancehall Summer Festival that has been set for Masvingo’s Mucheke Stadium on Saturday.
The festival will be hosted by Chipaz Promotions, and will be featuring great dancehall musicians such as Killer T, Seh Calaz and Souljah Love.
A number of dancehall artistes such as Ras Caleb, Flexxer, Jordan Valley originate from Masvingo Province and rose to higher ranks after working with some producers in Masvingo such as Gabriel Ndale well known in music circles as Ceeklear.
In an interview with Sunday Leisure, Ndale said the Masvingo Zim-dancehall bash was meant to promote dancehall music in Masvingo.
“This festival is meant to uplift Masvingo’s music industry and take it to another level. You will agree with me that Masvingo was lagging behind in terms of music development. Nothing has been happening in the city but this is not to say there is no talent. The city has abundant talent but lacks the push from promoters and its night life is not very live. This has seen a number of artistes leaving for Harare,” said Ceeklear.
Ndale launched Ceeklear music productions in 2013 and since then it has been the best dancehall music producing crew in Masvingo. He has produced renowned dancehall musicians in the country such as Guspy Warrior well known for his hit song Seunononga and Mafcatt in some of their great productions.
“Ceeklear music is one of the music production crews that are passionate about promoting local talent. We have worked hard to uplift local artistes such as Silvanos Chanduru who goes by the stage name Ras Chanduru and many others who we have managed to put on the country’s musical map,” said Ndale.
The 27-year-old did Sound Engineering at Demlin in Johannesburg from 2007 to 2010 before returning with the wealth of experience he is using now for the benefit of the local music industry. His first work was with Ras Caleb where they worked on a rhythm called Nehanda.
“Given the opportunity, Masvingo and other small cities can be great musical cities because the youths in most small towns and cities have the potential and zeal to be counted among big musicians in the country but they lack opportunities,” he said.
He also said they recently launched a new rhythm called Urban Art and they were working on some productions such as King of Kings Rhythm featuring up and coming musicians in Masvingo such as Chang chii and Frican J.
