That Familiar with Fuji music in the 1980s, the name Salawa Abeni would be remembered amongst the names that dominated the scene then. Abeni was the Tiwa Savage of her time.
The self -proclaimed Waka queen said she earned N50 when she started out as a musician. Salawa began her professional career in waka music when she released her debut album titled, Late General Murtala Ramat Mohammed, in 1976, on Leader Records.
It became the first recording by a Yoruba female artist to sell over a million copies in Nigeria.
When asked about the first salary she earned as a musician, she said:”When I started , I was really young but we had Baba egbe i.e an elderly man that kept the money we earned from our performances. He would then share the money and N50 was my first salary but there were no N50 notes then. I remember I was given 50 kobo in four places, one N10 note and one N20 note . Then, only the rich sprayed musicians with N5 notes at parties. There was no N50, or N100 in those days. When they invite you to perform in those days, we charged N50 but later, we increased our charges to N500 and later to N1,000 to perform at parties. We had enough to spend and save but Baba egbe was in charge of our money i.e he was like the treasurer”.
