Flavour recalls humble beginning, recounts how he was chased out of stage for P-Square
Nigerian high-life musician Chinedu Okoli, widely recognized as Flavour, recently shared the story of his early days in the music industry.
He recalled a memorable performance with a challenging situation when he was requested to step down from the stage so that the iconic duo PSquare, who are regrettably no longer together, could take over and entertain the audience.
During an interview on the “In My Opinion” podcast, released on Sunday, August 18, Flavour shared the story of his early music career. He explained that he initially started as a choir conductor and drummer in the church before transitioning into the music industry.
Afterwards, he joined a music band that specialized in training young boys to become musicians. After 13 years with the band, he made the decision to pursue a solo career as a singer.
He said things became very tough for him during those days. However, he noted that things eventually began to change when he started seeing certain artists who inspired and challenged him to sit up.
“When I left the band, I went into the streets. That was when the game became hard. All this time, I was in a good place; the music had procedures and all, but now I was in the streets.
“Like a street musician hustling, I went to different joints to play. I could sing so many songs; I had like 5,000 songs I could sing and play to entertain people.”
The singer said he established a consistent performance venue at the City Centre in Enugu, where he held regular performances from 8 pm to 3 am. Over time, he had been successful in developing a dedicated fan base. However, he expressed frustration that bigger artists, despite performing for shorter durations, received a more enthusiastic reception from the audience.
‘We play from 8pm until 3am, but then I see these artistes; they play for like 30 minutes, and everybody is happy, clapping for them and hailing them. And I’m wondering, ‘what is going on? Are we not same artistes?’ he recount.
The artist reminisced about the occasion when P-Square visited the venue to promote their single “Temptation,” highlighting it as a turning point in his life due to what transpired in the venue.
He said he was interrupted while he was in the middle of his performance when Psquare suddenly arrived. Without any hesitation, the manager loudly exclaimed, “Hello! Off that thing,” indicating that he should switch off his microphone and exit the stage immediately.
“I switched off, and I passed the microphone, went somewhere and sat down.”
Flavour recounted the pulsating energy of the fans as the twins belted out their tunes. As he watched, he wondered whether they were performing a different kind of song from his own.
After this particular experience, he realized that he needed to evolve from simply being a musician to embracing the role of an artiste.
“Then it started occurring to me that these guys, the difference is that they create their sound, go to the studio, and record. That’s how it’s done. So you are just a music man.
“So I decided to change from a music man to an artiste, and that was the difficult part of it because I thought it was going to be easy. I could play, I could sing, but to create your own sound, where are you going to start from?
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