New music streaming platform for Malawi

Already Mvelani.com holds approximately 1000 tracks from over 80 artists covering old and new music, and recorded over 50 000 minutes of listening time in just their first four days. Kapanga is reportedly working with the Malawian authorities as the site grows to establish the chance for featured acts to receive payment per play, similar to larger music sharing platforms such as Spotify.

Now working at an international bank in London, Kapanga moved to Scotland in 2003 to study at Glasgow Caledonian and Strathclyde universities.

Kapanga recently told UK newspaper Daily Record: “This project is extremely personal to me as the idea for the site originated through my own frustration at being unable to find music from home online. I hated having to constantly rely on asking my family to send it on to me and keep me up to date. I knew I couldn’t be the only person in this situation and so I came up with a way I could help make it easier for others. I also realised there was great potential for introducing the talented artists of my home country to a new international audience.

“I am surprised the idea hasn’t been tried already but I am delighted with its success so far. The site already hosts the biggest concentration of Malawi music in the same place online and interest from artists wishing to add their tracks is growing.

“It’s my dream to cultivate the site into the largest music catalogue of its type and to have every song recorded or produced from southern African artists available for download or streaming online and on mobile,” added Kapanga.

Mvelani aims to be the biggest online and mobile platform of African music. It came about as a result of the fact that the majority of music consumption today generates little to no money for artists. Mvelani aims to fix this by offering music fans a legitimate service capable of generating for artists the royalties that they deserve.

Users and artists are able to share their music on the platform, easily done by creating an account and uploading those songs to it. Before they go live, Kapanga and his team make sure that the uploads are of good quality.

Kapanga hopes that by bringing listeners onto the platform, the site turns them away from piracy and less monetised platforms and allows artists to generate greater royalties than they were before, thus changing music consumption habits.