After keenly listening to two musicians one being a good friend, I have a feeling that music is one profession with serious hidden dark power that may be natural. My friend who had two successful Benga albums has always told me that music is one stupid profession with stupid players in it that its very hard for a simple and sober man to survive in. For instance my friend tried putting up a band but was pissed off and left making music all together.

For instance he said that the most talented and senior most member of the band, in this case his lead guitarist would fail to show up for one important show and did not even bother to give apologies. At some point one musician would decide to leave with a girl friend at the middle of a concert and would not show remorse the following day. He said at some point he had to go for his musicians physically to carry them to the concert hall, then again it is even hard for the leader to know where they live.They keep changing.

He said that the life of a good musician was not easy to understand, They would act in a weird manner, abuse drugs and would most of the time would lack proper reasoning.

He said that you can not TRUST a musician. A musician he said has many faces. He said its a hard balance to have musicians happy in your band because if they are paid well they don't come to work the following day, if they are paid less they embarrass you with your donors on stage, they beg and spoil your name, They disappear with older women.

He said the intense rivalry that is always there in the band among members may break you up as a leader.

He says musicians world wide most of the time receive money that is not clean. He says most of the time what musicians are paid is not what promoters are able to fetch from gate collections if there are no corporate sponsors. He gave the case of koffi's last visit to Kenya where he was paid $100,000 and surely way above what could be collected from ticketing. He said guys with dirty dealings use musicians for money laundering. Just last week I could see that to be true with Chris Brown concert in Mombasa where he was reported to have been paid nearly 1 million dollar but tickets were only selling at 200 dollars.

Those who have been close to musicians kindly share about their personal life.

 he is absolutely spot on

Very true.

Music has received a very bad name generally in africa.

In most cultures music is associated with vices and musicians are considered to have loose morals, and associated with such things as the OP states. Some ( is it most) Musicians themselves do not help when they get into the life of drugs and women,  thereby giving the impression that to get into music requires indulgence in these things. Indeed I have seen anumebr of musicians who give up on the profession due to teh image created of it and they do not want the notoriety of it all.

There is also the culture of cutting down th successful musicians, either by spreading rumours of Kindoki, or poaching, or simply going for witchraft in teh hope that the beleifs will affect teh success of teh musicians.

Music can be successful to the disciplined artist who taek their profession seriously and is committed to it, a steh rewards are long in coming, especially when one has to compete with a crowded field and build a reputation. Dedication and gettign the proper structrue has always been the weakness of African professions ( be it football teams, musing business e.t.c.)

We need to learn that anything worth doign and that is to suceed requires devotion, teamwork and focus on the long term, and nothing comes from quick jobs and easy money....

Mwanamokili the major problem in a band based ochestra is that you need other musicians to succeed and in this case they mess you up even if you are disciplined and hard working.

 one thing which often makes me laugh is how even when they receive some money you'd be shocked about how hard they still criticize their leaders in private, i wont give his name but one day i was with a musician and he was complaining that he has nothing and leader is evil and stuff like that and was asking me if i can introduce him to some donors, and at some point  his phone fell on the floor and money went out of his pocket while he was taking the phone,and the guy had 2000 dollars in his jacket but was sooooo angry  whereas those 2000 came from his leader

Ken : I hear you. The discipline in most team activities is sorely lacking. When you observe even for example Athletics,  African stars shine in individual races, but the relays, we are yet to make it. in football, no sooner is an african team in a semi or quarter-final that squabbles arise leading to low morale, the team loses, or the managers tinker with the team to include their relatives, e.t.c

Back to music, most musician band leaders lose control of a band immediately the money starts coming in, or they lose their best artists due to squabbles. Our musicians need to learn that to make it requires personal discipline and the fortitude to persevere the long hard struggle to make a name and create a foundation of loyal fans who can sustain them.

Archos, I agree about the issue of musicians and their greed. Most of the musicians want a certain lifestyle that either echoes who their role models are or what they see of the musicians in the Videos on MTV, not knowing that those cars, joints, etc are props to shoot a video and the star in the video does not necessarily live like they see on MTV.  some musicians have an imagination that their leader is keeping money from them, and they seek to get more than their fair share, greed or impatience to get to the big life.

It is a wonder that Franco kept his very large team of musicians in line and we did not hear the level of infighting in current bands today. I doubt i fhe could keep the fifth generation of musicians happy if he was alive today though....

Ken : I hear you. The discipline in most team activities is sorely lacking. When you observe even for example Athletics,  African stars shine in individual races, but the relays, we are yet to make it. in football, no sooner is an african team in a semi or quarter-final that squabbles arise leading to low morale, the team loses, or the managers tinker with the team to include their relatives, e.t.c

Back to music, most musician band leaders lose control of a band immediately the money starts coming in, or they lose their best artists due to squabbles. Our musicians need to learn that to make it requires personal discipline and the fortitude to persevere the long hard struggle to make a name and create a foundation of loyal fans who can sustain them.

Archos, I agree about the issue of musicians and their greed. Most of the musicians want a certain lifestyle that either echoes who their role models are or what they see of the musicians in the Videos on MTV, not knowing that those cars, joints, etc are props to shoot a video and the star in the video does not necessarily live like they see on MTV.  some musicians have an imagination that their leader is keeping money from them, and they seek to get more than their fair share, greed or impatience to get to the big life.

It is a wonder that Franco kept his very large team of musicians in line and we did not hear the level of infighting in current bands today. I doubt i fhe could keep the fifth generation of musicians happy if he was alive today though....

It was not a wonder that Franco kept his team of musicians in line. It was because that he, Tabu Ley & Verckys had the Congolese Music-Industry in the pocket. They made populair youngster bands and bands of their ex musicians split. Bands like Thu Zahina, Zaiko Langa Langa, Les Maquisards of Ntesa Dalienst, Afrizam of Ndombe Opetum and Revolutionair of Kwamy Munsi are some of the many exempels. So guys like Ndombe, Josky, Dalienst had the choice to stay in the band or starting a solo carreer and being broke in 2 or 1 years.

Many people says that Franco made alot of musicians, while the most made their name first in Tabu Ley's band or the shot-off bands of the African Fiesta-clan (Dr. Nico/Tabu Ley)

Mvulusi, that means Franco will still get credit for keeping likes of Ndombe even when they had made a name. I take Franco's as a special case indeed.

Indeed, Franco was guilty of raiding other groups for talent early in his growing era.

However, what I meant about his management talent was that after his growth phase, T.P.OK Jazz had a very big team of greatly talented musicians, who were good enough to go solo, and create their own bands. I know for T.P OK Jazz fans, each have their favourite composer, singer or performer (Besides Le Grand Maitre' of course), each of who could have left OK Jazz and carry the fan base to establish themselves.

The fact that the great musicians of OK Jazz stuck together for so long ( some leaving and returning Like Josky) says a lot about the management of the band.

Too bad nowadays the musicians are very impatient to go solo and get to be their own leaders without putting in the work and effort needed. No sooner has a musician done a number in a big Album that gets noticed does he go around looking for donors to raise money for a band. After leaving and trying to get their own group and drop an ablum, reality dawns and they discover that there was much more to it than their one hit...