By: Staff Writer
July 23, 2021
An established creative talent manager said that there is a lot of musical talent in the Caribbean but the problem is they need to be developed to become commercially viable.
Dr Keron Niles, managing director of Koru Green Ltd and also manager of the Freetown Collective, told Caribbean Magazine Plus about his company Koru Green Ltd that it “commercializes creative content.”
He added: One of the main services that we provide is artist management, particularly as it relates to the music sector. However, we do have clients from a number of cultural industries as our core mission is to ensure that persons can earn a sustainable livelihood from their art or craft.”
Explaining how he got into the music business, he added: “I actually had a technical policy position in the government that was seeking to ascertain how Trinidad and Tobago could enhance economic diversification by making the best of opportunities in the creative sector. That work required in depth research, inclusive of interviews related to the music sector.
“One of the groups that I interviewed was Freetown Collective and they asked me to get more involved (on a professional basis) in the sector. Initially I was very reluctant and actually said no. After leaving my government position, the founding members of Freetown Collective asked again. I decided to investigate the opportunity a bit more. As they say, one thing led to another, and the rest is history.
Dr Niles, sounding upbeat on the “growing” and continually “developing” Caribbean music scene, said: “Some countries in the region are in the process of developing policy frameworks and regulations that would allow the industry to grow, while others need to enforce existing laws.
“There are also more opportunities for specialisation in the Caribbean music sector now. Specialization not only increases our understanding of how different parts of the industry work but also helps to develop the entire creative ecosystem. In this regard, particularly the work and continued development of state Intellectual Property Offices (IPOs) in the region has been encouraging, even though IP regulation in some Caribbean territories is still underdeveloped, I believe that work is ongoing.”
“One challenge related to the Caribbean music scene is that, although growth is happening, much of it is occurring in the traditional sectors of Reggae/Dancehall and Carnival music (which typically is Soca, Rapso and Calypso). We are seeing signs of growth outside of the traditional music genres, but that growth is slower.
Talent is all around the Caribbean and can be found form the church house to the theatre, as Dr Niles said: “To use the analogy: ‘In most sectors there is an upstream, midstream, and downstream. Upstream is the raw talent that you have, midstream is where the refining takes place and downstream is where the product meets the market. In the oil & gas sector, the downstream is the gas station, the midstream is the refinery and the upstream is an oil rig where they take the raw oil out of the ground.’
“In music, finding good talent can be going to the theatre, an open mic or even church. It is most certainly not hard to find good musical talent. It is all around in the Caribbean region. There is no shortage. The shortage occurs in the midstream, which refers to those skills that help to make the raw talent commercially viable, so that persons can feed their families by creating a sustainable livelihood from their art.
“That work refers largely to lots of research and marketing that needs to take place. That’s where the real gap is in the Caribbean region. We do have a lot of capacity when it comes to booking artists. There is much less capacity related to building a strategy for a music career and understanding the specific music product or target market of an individual artist and helping that artist to build a career from their craft. Those skills are in high demand, which is a big part of the reason why Koru Green is highly involved there. We have also encouraged other firms to get involved as well because it really helps the entire region to grow.”
The Freetown Collective just recently produced their latest single, “Kasandra” on June 11, 2021 said Dr Niles. “We are currently very keen to share that track with the world. Just before that, we also released Oshun (Lullaby version). Both songs are available wherever music is sold.”
Helping the Caribbean culture overall is paramount for the Freetown Collective manager, where he said: “Essentially, a lot of people are involved in the creative sector as a form of secondary employment because they are unable to feed their families solely from doing what they love. The more work that Koru Green does in the sector, the more that we can allow people to do what they love on a full time basis.
“Things grow when we invest resources in their development. Our own culture is no different. If we want to see it grow, we must be willing to devote the time and energy required to nurture the development of the Caribbean music industry and Caribbean culture as a whole. The more this happens, the more we allow the music sector and Caribbean culture in itself, to grow. The sector will not grow spontaneously on the wheels of inevitability.
“Much of the growth that has occurred in the past has occurred due to the work of Multinational Corporations (such as record labels) that have visited the Caribbean, spotted talent, and developed this talent in other territories. While nothing is wrong with this, it also means that a lot of the capital gained from commercializing such talent remains outside of the Caribbean.
“The Caribbean region is no stranger to music and Caribbean culture is rooted in a long legacy and tradition of home-grown talent. What we often lack are the marketing and distribution networks that would allow us to share our music strategically with the world. Technology has revolutionized this space, but we still need to invest in the development of our professional and commercial networks to be able to exploit the opportunities presented by technologies in meaningful ways. In other words, while anybody can get their songs onto any Digital Service Providers (DSPs) or streaming platforms, it’s much more difficult to get your song onto a well-known curated playlist and this really matters in terms of growing your audience. You still need the commercial networks; you still need to grow your professional networks of other music professionals in other territories that will be willing to help you to grow your audience across the world. This is what we’ve been doing, and it has been working and we are able to observe steady growth, so we will continue to do this work to the benefit of Caribbean culture.
The COVID-19 pandemic cannot stop this energetic innovator, as Dr Niles affirmed that the pandemic “has not slowed down production” at all with Freetown Collective. He added, however,
“COVID-19 has slowed down performances and almost brought performances to a standstill. There is much less touring because there isn’t anywhere for most performers to go and there have been less opportunities. With that said, we have sought to create our own opportunities to perform online and we have had opportunities to perform at many virtual events. However, for many artists, live performances constitute a significant share of their earnings, and that portion of activities has slowed which represents a significant impact of Covid-19. Notwithstanding this, we did manage to pivot to other activities, while ensuring that we stay true to our core values as a group.
“One main way we sought to do this was through our Love Over Everything Campaign, which is where we actually focus on Gender Based Violence (GBV) which worsened during Covid-19. “We used one of our songs Oshun (Lullaby Version) to draw attention to the serious nature of GBV across the entire Caribbean region. To do this, we recruited 3 female filmmakers who have been asked to each produce a short film related to GBV. We had Maya Cozier from Trinidad and Tobago, Gabrielle Blackwood from Jamaica and the final filmmaker will most likely be from Barbados/St. Vincent. We are looking forward to working with her to keep the issue of GBV on the front burner as a key issue that needs to be addressed within the Caribbean. We have partnered with Associated Brands Industries Limited, to help us to get messages about GBV out to as wide an audience in the Caribbean as possible and we intend to continue work of this nature for the foreseeable future.”