Americans R&B Neyo teams with up with African stars on Coke Studio season 3

FOLLOWING months of speculation, R&B and Pop sensation Ne-Yo will feature on Coca-Cola’s African music show, Coke Studio Africa, for the new season.

Ne-Yo will be the guest star alongside, Wangechi (Kenya), Alikiba (Tanzania), Maurice Kirya (Uganda), Dama Do Bling (Mozambique) and Ice Prince (Nigeria) for a mega mash up.

Ahead of his anticipated arrival in Kenya, in an official statement, Ne-Yo said, “it’s a true honour to return to Africa and celebrated artists from all over the continent.

By creating this musical fusion through Coke Studio Africa, people of all races, ethnicities and religion will come together through this remarkable opportunity. I’m so excited to build lasting moments with all of these incredibly talented artists and musicians.”

While in Kenya, Ne-Yo will work on a special Coke Studio Africa song alongside five selected stars from Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda and Mozambique, who have already recorded mash-ups for the new season.

Last month, Ne-Yo graced the MTV Africa Music Awards 2015, which held recently in South Africa. In the past 10 years, Ne-Yo has produced six albums.

His debut album In My Own Words was a bona fide R&B game changer bearing classics: Stay, So Sick, When You’re Mad and Sexy Love. His latest album, Non–Fiction, was released in January of 2015.

The album reached number five on the US Billboard Top 200, making him the second male R&B artist to have six consecutive top 10 albums.

The musician, who has collaborated with a host of award-winning artistes and songwriters, has several global hits under his wing, including Let me Love You, Beautiful Monster, Coming with You and She Knows featuring Juicy J. Last year on Coke Studio Africa season 2, Wyclef Jean performed his hit song, Divine Sorrow, alongside other artists, including Rabbit, Chidinma and Shaa.

The new season has so far seen the likes of Chameleone, Olamide, Jua Cali, Elani, Vanessa Mdee, 2 Face Idibia, Fid Q, Juliana Kanyamozi and Neyma, among others to record in the exciting new mash-up arrangement.

Grammy Award nominee, musician and producer Zwai Bala, of groundbreaking South African Kwaito group, TKZee, have been working as the music director while Brett Lotriet, a renowned International TV director and producer will be the series producer.

In addition, the musicians along with the highly talented house band have also presented new tracks each week produced by both local and international producers.

Some of the producers include Jaaz Odongo, Eric Musyoka and Kevin Provoke from Kenya, Cobhams Asuquo, Masterkraft and Chopstix from Nigeria, Owour Arunga from USA, Nahreel from Tanzania and Silvastone from the UK.

Commenting about the show, Marketing Director, Coca-Cola Nigeria Limited, Patricia Jemibewon, said, “we started out to create a show which can become a bridge among artistes on the African continent, and in extension bring happiness to fans through renewed creativity.

Being that Coca-Cola is the universal exponent of happiness, we have employed music which is a universal and valued way of expressing emotion to break down inexistent collaboration and cooperation among musical artistes on the African continent.”

Coke Studio Africa purposes to celebrate and showcase the diversity of African musical talent by giving upcoming artists the opportunity to work with some of the best local and international music and production talent.