Church must pay artistes—Patience Nyarko

GOSPEL artiste, Patience Nyarko, has joined the chorus of voices demanding Gospel artistes are paid, especially when they perform at churches, because the era of being sent off with just ‘God bless you’ is now a thing of the past.

The topic of paying Gospel artistes after performing in churches have come up lately and anytime the issue is broached, it is received with mixed feelings.

While some see it as part of the salvation journey, many believe it is work and they should be respected and adequately compensated just like regular artistes.

In a conversation with Graphic Showbiz on Tuesday, August 9, Patience Nyarko put it in a rather humorous way, “the days when they tell you ‘God bless you’ are over, they are long gone.

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"We won’t take that anymore because a lot of things go into preparing for performances.

We buy petrol to go to the venues, play with our team, wear clothes etc. so it is only fair that we are paid for our performances, everybody is paid for the work they do so why shouldn’t Gospel musicians also be remunerated?

‘‘I believe that how you sell yourself is how you will be bought, what I do is I ask whoever is engaging my services to talk to my manager.

"He will mentioned a price and if you are okay with it or can afford it, we are good to go otherwise there is no deal and that is what I expect all my colleagues to do,’’ Patience Nyarko stated.

"Let’s sell ourselves very well so that we don’t end up going home to cry after unfruitful deals, times are really tough and one would not want to go into something and lose so let’s make very good use of our managers, that is the reason they are there for us.’’

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Patience Nyarko, however, added that there were occasions that she didn’t mind performing at some churches for free because of the relationship she had with their leaders.

"’There are pastors who are our spiritual fathers or good friends so we can’t charge them.

‘’Those are the only rare occasions that we perform for free because we have some kind of a relationship with the people involved otherwise we will have to be paid accordingly,’’Patience Nyarko said.

The Obi Nyani Me hitmaker released a single titled Jesus In The Boat early this year and she said it is doing quite well.

‘‘Jesus In The Boat has received appreciable airplay since I released it early this year, these days things have changed a bit but we are managing.’’

"I will entreat my fans to pray for me and who knows, I may surprise everyone with another single before the end of the year, let’s just see how it will go but do remember me in your prayers,’’ she said.

Patience Nyarko has been in the Gospel music industry for almost a decade and she has produced some great songs like Obi Nyanime, W’fom Kwan, Anibre Mpaye, Wasore, Menwu, Oboboba, Wodaada, among others.