Music platform 'OyOsMusic' officially launched in Zimbabwe

Innovative, captivating, awe-inspiring and revolutionary. These are all words that can be used to describe the unveiling of Zimbabwe's first ever online music store - OyOsMusic. The event occurred in the form of a blossoming ceremony that was held at Star FM Studios on Friday that featured a rather illustrious guest list and stellar performances from some of the OyOsMusic signed artists. The host was none other than Star FM's very own Nikki whilst the guest of honour was Hon Minister of Information, Communication, Technology, Postal and Courier Services, Mr Supa Mandiwanzira. Overall the night was put to celebrate this step forward to curb music piracy in Zimbabwe and channelling the artists' sweat into hard-earned profits.

The launch was a red carpet cocktail event and featured appearences from some of Zimbabwe's great local artists including Sandra Ndebele, Tamy, Teererayi Mugwadi, Ngoni Kambarami and Nesto. The event was by invite only with guests ranging from signed artists with the OyOsMusic brand to the very sponsors. Guests were lucky enough to witness performances from Tamy, Millicent and Sandra Ndebele all of which were thoroughly enjoyable. They also managed to connect more with the brand as they received more information to do with the platform and also witness a demonstration of how to use the application.

Apart from the brilliant performances by the different artists, guests also received speeches from Zimhost Web designer Senior Project Manager and also the man behind the OyOsMusic platform, Mr Pearson Pfavayi and Min Supa Mandiwanzira. Mr Pfavayi  emphasized the importance of mindset change in our country in order to revive our music industry and how the OyOsMusic platform has helped aid in the fight against piracy in the country. The Minister spoke adamantly about promoting our local artists ridding our streets of the menace of piracy which has plagued our music industry for the past few years. He showed appreciation for the efforts of the OyOsMusic team not only through his riveting speech enveloped with humour, but by donating a total of $5 000 worth of radio airtime for our local artists to be heard. At the end of his speech, Minister Mandiwanzira officially launched the product by cutting the ceremonial ribbon. He jokingly remarked that no opening ceremony would be complete without a ribbon to cut, even though the brand was online.

To date the brand has already made quite a hefty list of achievements which they set out to celebrate at the event chiefly, succeeding in giving out its first quarterly payouts and the progression it has made in the on-going fight against music piracy in our country. The very heart of the whole gathering however, is to celebrate the brand finally coming to life, the love of our very own home grown music and how well received it has been by the Zimbabwean community. To date OyOsMusic has signed over 132 artists and the online store has currently over 6000 songs accessible by the Zimbabwean community in all parts of the world. The music is available on their website (www.oyosmusic.co.zw) or the android app available on the Google Play Store ("OyOsMusic"). To support our local artists, one can simply browse, preview, select and pay for the track of their choice.

It would have been impossible to hold such an event without a reliable team of sponsors supporting the event and the OyOsMusic team is grateful to Star FM, Ster Kinekor, The Volt, Tropical Sounds and Music Distributors, Firstmate, Bilebanal, Empire Styling, Grantpack Printing Company, Jan Jam, Zimhost Webdesigners and Bhello City Foods. Ultimately, OyOsMusic is optimistic that their brand will serve as a wake-up call to the entire Zimbabwean community to re-instigate the culture of buying and selling music in our country.