Advances in technology have not only made musicians’ lives easier, they have enhanced the listening experience for their fans. The leap from magnetic-based tape cassettes to digital CDs dramatically improved quality, and now a new trend is developing that might be similarly enhancing — using DVDs (Digital Versatile Discs) to disseminate not just the music, but videos and much more.
Audio DVDs are a huge trend internationally, as record companies and stars try to capitalise on the added-value promotional material (music videos).
Local company Madiba Music is making use of this DVD technology to market two compilations of South African music — one of “world” music and the other of African jazz.
For the past few years “enhanced” CDs have been produced, using computers to play short movie clips or a self-starting navigation screen to detail added features, including a link to the band’s website.
The DVD has revolutionised the film and home entertainment industry, providing a far superior quality than video. Because the DVD can store so much data (as much as 10 times more than an average CD) it has been possible to include soundtracks in various languages, subtitles and added-value content, such as the making of videos, and biographies of and interviews with stars.
DVDs of cult classics such as Star Wars include documentaries on the computer-generated animation. This often results in “collector’s editions”, where a second disc is included in the package to store all these extras — and so increases the revenue for the manufacturers.
DVDs have proved a popular means of re-releasing old movies and television series, too, which are cleaned up or “remastered”. African DVD (www.africandvd.co.za), the producers of the two Madiba Music titles, distribute other African content on DVD, including TV programmes such as Yizo Yizo and Shaka Zulu and local movies Jump the Gun and Mapantsula.
And Abbey Road Studios, famous for the eponymous Beatles album, last year added a purpose-built DVD remastering suite to its facilities. Abbey Road Interactive, a subsidiary of EMI, said that in six months last year its clients more than doubled and that an increasing number of them are record companies keen to exploit a new market.
The launch of the Madiba Music DVDs is an innovative use of the technology that could catapult sales of South African music. It cleverly makes use of both sides of the data disc to include the world’s two dominant video standards. While PAL is the system used here, and in parts of Europe and Asia, NTSC dominates in the United States, Canada and the Far East. So tourists can purchase the DVD in South Africa and still be able to play it back home.
By including both standards on the DVD, the producers have played a trump card that makes the disc consumable all over the globe.
“We’re pitching it to sell internationally, and the interest has been incredible and immediate,” says Kerry Friedman from Madiba Music, which licensed all the music content from the various record companies.
“These DVDs are not just about watching 11 or 12 music videos, it’s really about giving people an insight into the music and musician. There are extra interviews, text pages on the tracks and artists, biographies and pictures.”
The DVD quality “is so high it is tremendously exciting for African content”, says Nicola Rauch, managing director of production house DCC, which put the DVD together for African DVD.
“It’s one of those instances where technology serves the underdog incredibly well. I believe that about the film titles, too. As far as the technology goes, we’ve tried to raise the bar as far as what’s out there in South African music.”
As well as interviews with the artists, the DVD features surround sound and a choice of stereo and commentary tracks from Michelle Constant and Nothemba Madumo from SAfm. It has subtitles on all the tracks in five languages: English, Zulu, Spanish, German and French.
Two other “cool” features, says Rauch, are the ability to program a play list and set the DVD to play a random sequence. The latter is common on CD players but not standard on DVDs.
“Audio DVD is the revolution of the music industry,” says Rauch.
While jazz is a well-known quantity, “world” music — mostly traditional music that is sometimes reworked with modern elements and often very instrumental — is a blossoming market for the music industry. Recent years have seen this genre boom, with a variety of offshoots, including concerts such as Womad that are held in several cities around the world.
“What we’ve tried to do with both of them is not just give the expected stuff,” says Rauch. “If you buy a South African compilation from Amazon, you’ll get the usual tracks but we’ve tried to be a bit wider in our vision. We’ve tried to introduce people to other music they might not have thought of. For example, Sanscapes, including San music that has been remixed by [United Kingdom] DJs. So the origins of trance have become the modern trance.”
Another example is Busi Mhlongo, “who really rocks but she hasn’t had the kind of exposure internationally”.
The world DVD features Yvonne Chaka Chaka, Tananas, Kalahari Surfers, Oliver Mtukudzi, Mondetta, Madala Kunene and Bongo Maffin; while the jazz DVD features big-name musicians such as Hugh Masekela, Don Laka, Sibongile Khumalo, Sipho Gumede, Moses Molelekwa, Moodphase5ive and Vusi Khumalo.
Friedman, who is also Tananas’s manager, says there is an added spin-off for musicians. “Coming from the artist management background for the past 10 years, one of the first things an international promoter, like Womad, asks for is visual footage. Most South African artists don’t have this and if they do, it’s of poor quality. It’s a catch 22 position. If they sell more, the record companies give them the budget to make these kinds of visual promotions, but they can’t sell more without them.
“This is an incentive for record companies as an alternative medium for a musician to generate alternative revenue.”
Of the DVD menus and interface, Rauch says: “Hopefully it is just a starting point for the kinds of visuals that we can do. Our intention is to add live footage shot from numerous points of view. We’ve tried to add the layers of value people expect from an international DVD, which in turn serves the music very well by contextualising it.
“It becomes a really sexy platform for music and it’s the ideal platform for music to be listened to.”