Local artist Symphony is set to be featured on BBC Television. The BBC news team has confirmed their trip to the country from the 31st May till 9th June to do a series of interviews exposing local talent and have selected Symphony as one of the fortunate artists to be interviewed.
BBC news is creating content through covering some of the most celebrated artists on a program that will be aired on the international TV Channel. Buyie Cele who is Symphony’s manager has described this opportunity as a very rare and humbling opportunity seeing that Eswatini barely makes it in international media for positive news, let alone music or anything in the arts industry. “We have put in a lot of work to market Symphony’s music over the years and this rare occasion will put Eswatini on the map for the right reasons in the music industry on international media,” she narrated.
In 2016/17 BBC had the largest audience of any channel, with an estimated 121 million viewers weekly. The department is the world’s largest broadcast news organization and generates about 120 hours of radio and television output per day as well as online coverage.
BBC maintains 50 foreign news bureaus with more than 250 correspondents around the world and draws on its extensive network of journalists to deliver the biggest stories from across the continent and its diaspora.
BBC also has a popular program called ‘Focus on Africa’ where they with programs covering the arts industries through interviews, news and reviews from Africa.
When further probed, Cele explained the challenges that Swati artists face in breaking into the international market. “The arts industry is a numbers game, if your audience is small, your growth will be stifled and the return on the cost of making music and preparing for performances is thus not returned,” she said. “We really praise God for such opportunities that expand our territory and increase the opportunity of reward because it is generally only big countries with large populations that are able to support their artists adequately,” she further elaborated.
Symphony is a Swati born Urban Soul artist who has been raised in the church where she has served with her talent to sing. She has a unique Neo Soul sound that has earned her trips for performances in countries such as the kingdom of Eswatini Portugal, South Africa and was recently seen performing at Earth Hour hosted at House on Fire.
Symphony, real name Zanele Cele released her first album ‘Sengikhona’ in 2018 just after being awarded as the winner of MTN Bushfire’s Firefly Sound Storm in 2017 and also became 1st MTN SWAMA Awards Nominee 2017. In 2018, Symphony received a number of awards international and locally she became first ever AfriMusic winner and was crowned MTN SWAMA Best Female artist of the year and NACA Young Artist of the Year and an Honorarium Award from NACA for being recognised Internationally With her stunning appearance, you may have noticed Symphony as one of MTN Swaziland’s brand ambassadors in 2018/19.
