Doa Doa: Helping Revolutionize the Creative Arts Industry

You’ve probably seen an artist or DJ on your news feed talking about Doa Doa and have been trying to figure out what on earth they’re on about. Well, Doa Doa is a market for different stakeholders in the performing arts market. The performing arts market included artists, DJs, arts managers, arts institutions, club owners, festival programmers, publishers, music arrangers, radio presenters, arts journalists, television presenters, artists, promoters and copyright societies.

It has been touted as one of the most important events for any of the people involved in the industry even in small ways because let’s face it, a lot of artists and managers in the country fail in creating content that remains both relevant to their audiences while maintaining commercial appeal. Additionally, with the Kenya Music Policy having finally been released and panel discussions such as Earning Music Royalties in East Africa are definitely important. Still in reference to the Kenya Music Policy (a document anyone involved in music should have already read by now) another panel discussion holds important significance. “Let talk about East African Music on Radio, again!” discusses how there are more and more international initiatives in the world looking to show case East African music but ironically East African artists are getting less representation.

Also of note is that our favourite sound collective, The Santuri Project, will be hosting the “Sampling Heritage Workshop”. Santuri Safari has been at the forefront of driving a movement that samples traditional sounds and adds them to contemporary music. They will be working with local communities in the region to record collaborative content that draws from the Emabaire Xylophone and their own amazing electronic productions. Aside from that they will create discussions both with the community and industry stakeholders on regarding ethics and suitable forms of remuneration. Days where indigenous content is sampled without due credit being given should never be heard of again in our opinion.

Aside from this there will also be a host of musical performance from regional artists. The only country not represented in the performance/DJ line up is South Sudan. Hopefully next year we will see SS more represented so then Doa Doa can be truly regional.

For more information go their website www.doadoa.org

Look out for UP Nairobi’s coverage of Doa Doa