Music video director turned filmmaker, Dami Twitch, has said that Nollywood filmmakers can no longer freely include Afrobeats songs in their productions without obtaining proper clearance.
He made this known during a recent episode of the Afropolitan podcast, where he explained that the situation is largely due to the fact that many Afrobeats artistes are now signed to publishing agreements with foreign companies.
According to him, these contractual arrangements have made music licensing more complicated and expensive for Nollywood producers, many of whom operate independently and struggle to raise enough funding to cover such costs unless they have strong investor backing.
He added that this growing challenge is creating tension in the creative relationship between the Nigerian film and music industries.
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“Nollywood producers can’t freely use Afrobeats songs in movies anymore. Some artists have already sold their music rights, so adding their songs to films becomes difficult.
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“Even if the artist is my friend, they can’t give me permission to use their song freely because they have already entered a contract. That is a major challenge in the movie industry.
“The collaboration between Nollywood and Afrobeats is at a very weird place right now. A lot of producers can’t afford putting Afrobeats songs in their movies unless a big studio or investor supports them. Nigerian producers are mostly independent filmmakers so a lot of us won’t be able to afford it,” he said.
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