Oftentimes when we talk about the African music space, we hone in on the stories of the artists but forget to mention the people behind the scenes who make things happen. When you think of individuals on the continent who are and have shaped the music industry, Seven Mosha has to be at the top of that list.
Seven Mosha (Photo: courtesy of Seven Mosha)
From starting out in her younger years as a presenter at Clouds FM (Tanzanian media house), MTV Africa, working with and managing Tanzanian artists like Alikiba, TID, Lady Jaydee and more, to her current role as the head of Marketing and Artist Development in East Africa for Sony Music, you will find very few resumes more impressive than hers. She is an executive who has an eye for talent, strong business acumen and is unabashed in her quest to take East African music to a level never seen before.
In this interview, we dive into her two decades worth of experience in the industry, the growth of the Tanzanian music scene, artist management, AI and more.
Where did the name “Seven” come from?
Seven: My government name is Christine Mosha. Seven came about when I got my first entertainment gig with Clouds Media, which is a media house here in Tanzania.
While Clouds was the first time she introduced herself to the larger public as ‘Seven,’ the nickname predates itself back to primary school days where one of her teachers “talked a lot about the powerful numbers and seven stood out. Stood out in religion. And it stood out in nature.” Prompting her to start calling herself ‘Seven’ as she not only found the number powerful but useful in serving her future creative endeavor.
When you were growing up in Tanzania, specifically during your teenage school years, what kind of music were you listening to?
Seven: From the parents' side, I would listen to African music. You know, the likes of Ringo [Madlingozi], Oliver Mtukudzi, which were my dad's favorites. Remmy Ogala, and then also the international ones, which were popping at that time.
I remember there was a show that existed. My mom used to bring a lot of tapes of the program called “Top of the Pops.” And we used to watch the artists that were popping at that time, like Michael Jackson & Kenny Rogers. Then later on, my brother came in and introduced me to a lot of Classical music, so I listened to that as well and then Rock. And eventually I started listening to Jazz later on, coming to appreciate it very late in my life.
How did your interest in the music industry come about in the first place?
Seven: I’ve always liked music, but I never wanted to be a musician and I wasn't sure what to do. But I used to enjoy entertainment, specifically on the music side and would like to entertain.
Over time, Seven came to realize that her passion for music and entertainment was not so much in wanting to be the star herself but to work on the business side of things. She goes in detail to describe how her earlier days in the industry made that decision very clear.
Seven: You either be a musician or you talk about music. So I went to radio and then I went to TV, and I would say my biggest break in understanding the entertainment industry fully was when I started working with MTV Africa. And after that, that’s when I was just like, you know what? Yeah, I want to be a part of creation. I want to create, develop artists, and be an artist manager.
Seven Mosha (Photo: courtesy of Seven Mosha)
You started your career in radio, working at Clouds Media Group, then East Africa TV and eventually transitioned to MTV Africa where you headed up A&R and Commercial in East Africa, which included launching MTVbase in Tanzania. In your tenure within these roles, on radio and tv, can you draw a picture for us of what the Tanzanian music landscape was like and its eventual growth process?
Seven: Clouds was very instrumental in providing some sort of structure and understanding of our music. The music was already being developed and was already there, but I would say Clouds kind of commercialized it and packaged it in a way that people had access to relate to what they can understand and what they can hear.
Mosha recalls how the platforms that were around at the time mainly focused on ‘international music’ whereas Clouds honed in on branding the local sound of Bongo Flava and went as far as to create concerts such as its famed ‘Summer Jam’ series which later turned into ‘Fiesta.’ She said that home grown platforms like Clouds helped the Tanzanian music industry be “way ahead” amongst their East African counterparts.
Seven: So we were well advanced by the time East Africa radio and TV opened. And then Kenya and Uganda really started catching up. We also had a lot of Kenyan artists come into Tanzania, work with different artists, because we already had that structure.
Once MTV Africa was launched (2005), Tanzania now had to compete with their more established counterparts, Nigeria and South Africa. At first, there was some level of doubt given that Tanzania was a Swahili-speaking country and had different cultures and governance to West or South Africa. This had folks like Mosha thinking about how their music would translate across the continent. But at the end of the day, good music and quality production can easily translate across cultures.
Seven: Because at that time we had like three video directors who did really good music videos for us, they had come back from the States. So our music videos were very savvy. So we had a lot of airtime at MTV Africa.
In 2010, Seven Mosha experienced another career change that led her to leave MTV Africa to pursue her artist management ambitions at her own label and management company, Rockstar 4000.
Jandre Louw, who led the Events & Production department at MTV Africa, asked her to join him on his next endeavor of starting a record label. At Rockstar 4000, Jandre focused on the events and productions part of the business while Seven took charge of the talent & music.
One of the artists that Seven managed at 4000 was the King of Bongo Flava, Alikiba. These two’s first time working together was during a 2010 music campaign for Airtel, the telecom giant covering a good portion of the continent. The success of this project fueled what later would become one of the most prolific partnerships in contemporary Tanzanian music history.
Seven Mosha and Alikiba (Photo: courtesy of Seven Mosha)
Not too long after that, there was a young and energetic Tanzanian artist on the rise taking the whole of East Africa by storm and even gained a feature from Davido for his hit track “Number One.” That artist was none other than Diamond Platnumz. Upon seeing this undeniable momentum from Diamond, Seven believed that this was the right time to revive the career of Alikiba who had been quiet for some time leaving a vacuum to be filled by emerging artists within the Tanzanian music industry.
Seven began managing Alikiba, bringing him back onto the scene amidst nonstop doubts from the media about her inability to resurrect Kiba’s music career. Even with all the noise, Seven believed that Kiba’s talent and loyal fanbase would be a recipe for success.
After his three year hiatus from the industry, Alikiba released his hit record “Mwana” in 2014 under the management of Seven. I vividly remember when this song came out, and there is not a single East African function I would attend where they were not blasting this record. Alikiba also released more hit tracks a year later, such as “Aje” and “Nagharamia.” Which helped to fully cement his return to the game and was proof of Seven’s ability to successfully market and develop an artist amidst tense competition and naysayers.
He later went on to win Best African Act at the 2016 MTV EMA Awards, and became the first East African artist to be signed by Sony Music Africa all in that same year. But Seven was not just satisfied with having her artist be named Best African Act, she believed they could capitalize on this title and exposure by commercializing Alikiba’s brand.
Being a student of the game, Seven closely followed and studied the career moves of entertainment industry titans like Ariel Emmanuel, Scooter Brown, Rich Paul and even Hip-Hop legend turned business mogul, 50 Cent, to learn how she could merge artist, brand and commerce together.
Seven: So I read up on them and [they] were just like, you know, you turn the artist into a business brand. And I was just like, okay, what kind of business? I remember that time I was so fed up knocking on multinational companies asking for product placements, asking for that. I was just like there's something wrong with this picture. They need to influence our people using our stars. So why don't we just create our own products?
So I was just like, we have to come up with our own brands. We have to take an artist, make him the face of our consumers. So lucky enough, I came across a gentleman who had the same vision, but on a different scale. He used to work at a multinational [beverage] company.
Seven Mosha (Photo: courtesy of Seven Mosha)
Through her connection with Siphiwe Shongwe, a South African with deep knowledge of the beverage industry, they came together in 2018 to start an energy drink where Alikiba would act as the face of the brand.
Seven: We launched an energy drink, MoFaya. The buzz on the ground was ridiculous, it was amazing. And since the competition was flying around, Diamond had released his groundnuts. I met with Siphiwe Shongwe and we talked about our passion. He wanted to create so many other products. The energy drink was number one. Carbonated drinks was number two. And then we move into other stuff.
Being that they were newcomers to the beverage industry in Tanzania, Seven and her business partners faced stiff competition in getting the drink off the ground. Challenges stemmed from supply chain issues, distribution disruptions, regulatory hurdles and later on the COVID pandemic which completely changed the nature of business operations. These various challenges were so powerful that Seven even seeked the assistance of the former President of Tanzania, Jakaya Kikwete.
While dealing with the difficulties that came with running a beverage company, Seven also had to deal with the loss of one of her close friends and mentor, Ruge Mutahaba, a titan in the Tanzanian Entertainment industry where he spent years as an executive at Clouds Media Group.
Seven: Losing Ruge for me was like, it was painful. It was painful. He was someone that we started off work with. He mentored me. He ignited the passion that I had over talent. He was honored well when he passed on, but I was just like, he gave so much to the [Tanzanian] entertainment industry. And what he got towards the end, they did do [him] justice, but he gave more, way more. Ruge, to me, had another title. He was one of the founders of our music.
Later in 2020, Seven was approached by Sony Music Africa to head the East African market.
Seven: I was tasked to handle Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan, Eritrea, Somalia and sometimes a bit of the South, like Zambia, because they gravitate to East Africa music a lot. And I asked for DRC and Ethiopia as additional territories, those are the places that I manage. But eventually DRC was carved out to be handled by the Francophone [department].
There has been a lot of talk about the role of AI in the production of music or art within the entertainment industry. What, if any, kind of conversations are you and Sony Music Africa having about the role of AI in the African music landscape?
Seven: What we know so far is how it's affecting the West and how different organizations are reacting to it. But for Africa, I must say we haven't really latched on it yet. And from even a producer's point of view, because in Africa, the structure is just getting perfected in other countries, like let's say West and South Africa. The structure in South Africa has been there for a minute. But now is just the time that our music is crossing over and it's fresh and it's organic. That is, being accepted internationally. So I don't think even the artists or the producers would want to tamper with that.
Although Seven does not see AI playing a major role in the African music landscape in the near future, she did acknowledge that the technology could be effective in revamping old music material that have lost quality or use due to storage methods that didn’t maintain the original condition.
Abigail Chams (Photo: @abigail_chams/Instagram)
One of the artists under Sony Music Africa is a promising young Tanzanian artist named Abigail Chams. She recently released her EP 5, has an incredible voice, charisma and is versatile in her musicality as she also plays multiple instruments. What do you believe the future has in store for Abigail Chams? And is she the future of Tanzanian music?
Seven: When I got the Sony gig, the number one thing in my head was, “I'll prioritize female artists.” With the understanding of what it takes to be a female artist in the industry. I know how complicated it gets. So as a female, I would like to empower them and give them that chance. When I signed with Sony, she reached out to me and then I said, “okay.”
I was blown away by the talent, she had the drive and the ambition to be a perfect fit. I introduced her to Sony. So they liked her a lot. They saw the same thing I saw and then now we have a ‘developing’ contract with her, working with different kinds of producers, different kinds of songwriters and really expanding and understanding her music.
Do I think she's the one that will carry the music internationally? One-hundred percent. There are things that we need to work on as a territory to figure out what will take our music there. That involves culture as well, but at the same time, I think she has it in terms of personality, character, talent, drive, and passion.
Seven Mosha (Photo: courtesy of Seven Mosha)
You recently announced that BET and MTVBase Africa will be the official media partner of the Tanzanian Music Award, making it the first and only African country to have paramount media support from these two organizations. What will be the impact of this partnership on the exposure and growth of Tanzanian music?
Seven: In every single territory that I represent, they have their own areas that require a certain amount of development, for the music to be recognized internationally. The artists are doing a fantastic job on their own, but there's some sort of structure that needs to be in place for them to move towards.
Mosha’s quest to create a structure that will complement the growth of the local industry found her improving another staple within the country’s music scene; The Tanzania Music Awards, planned to take place on October 19th, 2024. This award show just like Alikiba had been dormant for some time, and Seven alongside her co-committee members saw this year as the right time to bring it back to life in a new fashion.
Seven: So we need to have an award show that compliments their brand. And we came up with a production house that will actually fit the brand. We're changing the logo, we're changing the trophy, everything from the look and feel to complement that stature.
This has also meant a total rehaul of the nomination process to include data gathering that can back up award nominees and winners, while also bringing on international media partners that can provide much needed global exposure of the award show.
Seven: And that's where MTV Africa and BET Africa come in. They'll come and pick their own content that they want and then package it in a 60 minute show and then air it. And to me that was just like giving Tanzania, not just the awards, but the music recognition outside of the country.
Seven Mosha (Photo: courtesy of Seven Mosha)
Beyond this, Seven has plans in the works to create a hub for Bongo Flava. This hub will exist via a dedicated website, museum and documentary. All of this work is a part of her mission to not only grow the genre, but tell the story of this art form to make sure that it's celebrated for generations to come.
Quite frankly, Seven Mosha has carried on the baton of her mentor, Ruge, in becoming an influential shaper of industry. When the history of Bongo Flava and Tanzanian music is written, Seven deserves an entire chapter dedicated to the storied impact that she has had on the sector. She’s not an executive who settles for good enough but requires business and artistic passion to work in tandem with another. Her relentless pursuit of excellence, success and progress is what the East African market needs more than ever. Seven has a vision that sees far beyond the shores of the Indian ocean in hopes of creating an impact that connects cultures and commerce one song at a time.
