Azande Greatest Artist of All Time Emmy J Yoere Urges for Unity among Artists from Western Equatoria
Emmy J Yoere is an artist with multiple talents, a vocalist, song writer and a music producer. He is considered to be a mentor in Western Equatoria State. He brought up many young artist including the current South Sudan highly rated Mr. No rest DJ CENT and many others.
By George Kparabatiko
Emmy J Yoere is an artist with multiple talents, a vocalist, a songwriter, and a music producer. He is considered to be a mentor in Western Equatoria State. He brought up many young artists including current South Sudan highly rated Mr. No rest DJ CENT and many others.
While in Juba, recently, the Catholic Bishop of Tombura-Yambio, Barani Edwardo Hiiboro called and met with Emmy J, an incident which the artist termed as a great honor and which he greatly appreciated.
“It was an honor to meet Bishop and talk to him. Very few people who are busy like him, people of his caliber can create time for artists like us. People only call us when they want us to entertain them and guests on their occasions such as a wedding. But to have someone like Bishop calling an artist just to chat, to enquire about our challenges and also get to encourage us, this rarely happens.”
Commenting about the challenges facing artists from Western Equatoria, among them, lack of unity among artists especially the Azande, Emmy J said that music is a competition; however, there is a need for a healthy competition that can enable musicians and other upcoming artists in the industry to grow.
“There are problems here and there, but I do believe that these can be resolved especially if the association of Western Equatoria Artists, which already exists, take it upon itself to mediate among the artists who have little issues here and there,” Emmy J said
The artist who is credited as a mentor to many upcoming artists not just in Western Equatoria but throughout the country says that he has more or less 99% good relationship with other artists from Western Equatoria.
“Truth is I have generally good relationship with everyone because I do not compete with them. If you have to see all the awards that have taken place in Western Equatoria, I have never competed. I consider myself as a mentor and a father to upcoming artists, and a father cannot compete with his children. So what I basically do is to advise and support the artists and for those who are close to me, I push them towards being better.”
He said that it is very important for artists to be well organized, get the necessary paperwork in order. He further said that there are many great talents from Western Equatoria and if they are to come together and organize themselves as artists from Western Equatoria and get registered as one entity and get the necessary paperwork, then it is possible for them to push projects together, push proposals and therefore achieve great things together. They can be able to organize, for instance, Western Equatoria Music Award, organize Miss Western Equatoria competition, organize Peace concert, and many other such initiatives.
“Initially we were divided as four states, now we are one state and we have such immerse talents from Western Equatoria, why don’t we think along organizing activities together to build ourselves, why don’t we think about doing something positive for our community?” he challenged his fellow artists from Western Equatoria.
Emmy J Yoere worked in Kampala Uganda for many years and decided to move his studio (REVOLUTION) back to South Sudan this year. He told Rurugene Online News during an interview in Juba that he prefers doing production as this unites him more with the people.
“When I am singing, it is just me as Emmy J. but when I am producing, I am interacting with a lot of talents and I appreciate working with other people,” he said.
Commenting on his work in Uganda and what he intends to do in Juba, Emmy J explained that Uganda was a place to nurture his talent. “Revolution Studio went to a higher level in Uganda, we were recognized nationally; we did all the registration as a company. But now we are back home, therefore whatever we are going to do in Juba has to be bigger than whatever we did in Kampala. This is home, we have to invest every effort.”
Emmy J indicated that they are currently working to establish the studio well in Juba. They have already rented a place and are working on the legal process after which the studio will be officially launched.
