She was at the height of her career as one of the best female vocalist in the country in the 80s and 90s until the unfortunate accident her son had while she was on national duty. Stella Monye, known as the Samba Queen is back to the industry that gave her fame after more than two decades hiatus. Enjoy this interview she had with Samuel Onyekwere
I understand you are working on new album ‘Iyaanu’, how far have you gone?
I have already completed the ‘Iyaanu’ album and I was going to set things in motion but He prepared me,’ took over because it came from another persons effort and they were ready for whatever it takes to push it out.
Your new song ‘He prepared me,’ is it out, what inspired the song?
Its a song written by a song company in America called Far Cry. It was inspired by some of the experiences I have gone through which inspired them to write the song for me. For a long time, I wanted to do the song but I found out that I was not mentally ready for it. However, I told myself that if I dont go back to work, I will continue to pay for that experience.
So, I went to the studio; I did the song and it came out on September 31.
Is it a gospel song?
No. Its an inspirational song.
Are you going to include the song He prepared me’ in the album?
Its a new terrain for me and I will be doing a couple of songs with Far Cry Songs that’s the name of the song company. They write songs for artistes. I will be doing a couple of songs with them and you know how these things work, its not like in our time when you record an album and you will have like 12 songs to have a complete album.
Now, by the time I do all the singles, it will be ready for album compilation which is how it works now, do singles and compile them and it becomes an album, unlike during our days when you have to suffer and includes songs in an album and then one becomes a hit
Any video on the single?
Both audio and video came out the same day.
You have been outside the music industry for a long time, how are you adjusting to the new trend in the sector now?
In the first place, my long absence was due to my sons accident which became so cumbersome because we have to travel from hospital to hospital and so, I really did not have time to pursue my career for almost two decades that I focused on my son’s treatment. Its not as if its over, its just that I told myself, if you dont go back to work; it will be even more difficult to pay his bills because his medical procedure is systematic and its being done in America. I just told myself, you have to go back to work and combine the two. I gave it time and I have gotten to that point where I can say okay; while its still going on, I can still work and cushion the effect of raising money for his treatment.
How has it been carrying the burden of your sons treatment for this long and where has help come from so far?
I will answer the first question you asked on how I am adjusting back into the business after so many years
I know its a generational shift from what we did and what these new generations are doing. Theres no competition. I am not competing with anyone because I believe that whatever I am doing now, I have just moved a bit higher. I have gone beyond singing about mundane things and my songs are inspirational songs based on experience, so I have to sing about positive things that can inspire people. Most of the things you will be hearing from me are positive and inspirational songs and it does not mean that all these while, i have not been singing inspirational songs.
Concerning my son, I have gone through a lot of emotional torture looking at him knowing that when he is in pain, I am in pain as well; knowing that this thing happened when I left him at home for national assignment. I feel guilt because if I had taken him along or had stayed with him, it would not have happened. I have even survived heart attack during this process because I also have my own underlying medical conditions. I am diabetic, I have BP and I am managing everything at the same time. Sometimes I call myself a cat with 13 lives. Financially, its cumbersome, emotionally its stressful and physically its demanding. Now that I have to combine my job with it, I have to look forward to tougher days ahead.
You were on national assignment when this accident happened, was there at a point government, or PMAN or your colleagues came in to support financially?
At the initial time when this happened I remember when we came back from Abuja, it was difficult because the General Hospital then did not do a good job on the surgery they did on him and that’s was the genesis of the problem. That was when we started moving him from one hospital to another and my colleagues came out and like I said, at every point there’s been like little support from here and there. They marched on the road with me to raise funds and at that time, we raised about N1m which did not go anywhere because each hospital we went to demanded much more than that because it was very complicated and complex surgery. I get help from here today, tomorrow I dont get help; its just being like that.
What’s the state of his health presently, I believe he is in the final stage now?
I pray so because a lot of things happened when we got to America, we had already visited India and Tiglish before we ended up in America all based on recommendations. When we ended up in America, they said they have not seen this kind of thing before because all the surgeries they did have really made things worse. They have really damaged a lot of his organs and there were a lot of technical things they have to perform on him to get him to where he is now.
Like I said, he doesn’t still have clean bill of health, they are still doing semantic treatment in that when they do one surgery for him, we have to wait for him to heal maybe like six months before we are back on the next one.
Maybe today they are working on his bladder; next time his intestine, or kidney. We are still working and praying that soon they will give him a clean bill of health but funding has been a very difficult part.
In totally, what did the doctors say is actually the problem with your son?
What happened is that when he had the accident, it was just one major problem and this now festered to other problems. They do this surgery, theres no success, they will say his bladder is not growing, we have to expand his bladder and something happens, they will say it has kicked his kidney, each time theres always a major organ involved, until everything becomes settled and they will give him clean bill of health.
You studied theater arts which took you on stage performances to a couple of places outside the country but you ended up in music, what happened? When did you change your mind?
It wasn’t a change of mind because I was really interested in theater arts. I thought that after my study I would become a TV producer or work with a radio station. I took a lot of interest in music and don’t forget that in theater, you do a lot of songs and dancing on stage. I started writing songs that I could use for my stage drama and then I wrote Oko mi ye’, somebody heard the song and said, ‘this one is good; you can make a record out of this.
I said I could try and that was how I took my tape to the record company EMI, I dropped it there and never got back to them or asked. So, one day a message came to my fathers house that my demonstration tape was no 1 at the panel and they said I should come for my contract. I was surprised, I didn’t take the whole thing serious, I went to EMI and the rest is now history. I recorded an album and it became a hit.
Why would a student write that song, Oko mi ye’ (my husband please) when you are not married?
It was inspired by my mum; she endured because she wanted to be with her children. She was really that kind of African woman who told herself that she was not going anywhere even if she has to die looking after her kids because my father was polygamous in nature. My father married more women after my mother, who was the first wife and it was really a battle. So, I have to do a song because of my mum.
Where did you derive the name, ‘Samba Queen’?
I was not the one that gave myself the Samba Queen; it was the media when I did Arigo Samba. After Arigo Samba which is very percussionist in style and Samba means percussion, like konga that they play in Brazil. Because of the percussion background, the media named me the samba queen, from then on I became the samba queen.
When you travelled to the Caribbean during one of your tours, they tagged you the bombshell. What really happened?
I wouldn’t know if there was anything special, all I know is that one of my greatest gifts is being able to perform well on stage, being able to interpret whatever I am doing very well on stage. I think I came around with something great from Nigeria.
I had strong band behind me: Zeal Onyia was behind me, Peter King, they were playing Saxophone, Lagbaja was the bassist, Willy BestMan was the drummer, Remy Kabaka was the drummer and I was in front. I was the one representing Nigeria and because of these great musicians that were behind me everything went explosive. It was great because Mariam Makeba was on that tour, she came to represent South Africa including other artists from all over the world were there.
It was the 150th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade in diaspora. It was just something to unify all the black people and also celebrate the abolition of the slave trade. It was great, like I said; when you have these people I mentioned behind you, of course; you cannot afford to fail. There were other great artistes and I said, I will go and hide my face but after the performance; the media chose me as the bombshell in that festival.
At a point, a lot of your contemporaries like Mike Okri, Alex O, Majek Fashek, Ras Kimono and others left the country, what happened that made them to leave?
One of the reasons is that the pirates were very hard on our generation. Secondly, most of the recording companies were already folding up because of the piracy issue and they were selling the companies off. It was only when the white men were managing those companies that they did well. As soon as they started selling the companies to the black people things became a bit difficult for them to cope with the economy because the pirates were really at work that’s why they were not really making much.
When the white people were here they were bringing money from their country to run the business, they did not really bother about the pirates. So, everything started wobbling at that point and when the companies started folding some of our generation left for greener pastures. That was when Kenny Ogungbe and Dayo Adeneye now came into the music scene and started changing the narratives with other younger artistes, but few of us stayed back.
The way you people sang in your days, you touched on issues happening in the society unlike what’s happening now when artiste talk basically about nothing that makes no moral sense at all. Is it the change in trends or because this is what the society wants?
Don’t also forget that music is evolving. We still have a lot of them that are still singing positive songs like Tubaba, Psquare, Asake and a whole lot of them still sing great songs. We don’t have music soldiers like Fela Anikulapo Kuti and Sunny Okosun, all these people that sang liberation songs.
The musicians of nowadays their orientation are different, the way they reason is different, and their morals standard are different. Things happening now never happened in our time, nothing like record companies, social media was not there. They practically own their own labels now and get all their money online, so they’re making money because the pirates cannot go online. CD is phasing out because people don’t use it anymore and nothing for pirates to lay hands on, so this generation is in a better positioned now. It’s a great development and it depends on what you listen to. There’s a particular song from Buju and I hear a lot of great songs from Buju, for me, I choose who to listen to because that’s who I want to listen to
Tell us any current artiste you will like to work with especially females?
The first person that came to my mind is Tiwa Savage, I could do my stuff with her and she would give a good interpretation. She has her own style of singing which I love very much and I know that anything she handles, she does that in her own unique way. I was working on it but somewhere along the line we lost touch and my son’s accident became a major distraction, I couldn’t go on with it, but if the opportunity comes, I will love to do collaboration with some of them including the male.
You have not tried your hands on full time acting in movies
I acted at some point. I acted in Caravan of Life, which was an NTA TV series and most of the acting was at the earliest part of my career. I did some Nigerian movies with the NTA. I did Magun, not long ago, I did Agbode Meje, (Cross road), a Yoruba movie.
When I went into music, I didn’t have the full time to go into acting. I love acting and I know I can act. I am really considering it, to see if I can go into full time acting but I still believe my music may not give me the opportunity. I am not competing with anyone; I will play my music the way I will think it will come out well. Its Gods grace that will propel you, not the kind of song you sing. I will be in my own class not to start dragging with these genzes. If somebody invites me to an occasion I will come and perform.
Are you thinking of doing a remix of some of yours songs?
Yes. Soon you will hear a remix of some of my songs. I am thinking of working with Olamide if I can get him. You know how difficult it is to get these boys.
