In the 1980s, a Christian Reformed Church in North America (CRCNA) missionary named William “Bill” Evenhouse, connected to Grand Rapids, Michigan, helped establish a gospel music recording ministry in Jos, Plateau State. It was an unlikely starting point for a story about Nigeria’s modern entertainment economy. Yet, the studios, musicians, training and networks that grew around that ministry would help make Jos one of the country’s remarkable incubators of musical talent.

Among the early voices recorded in that environment was my eldest sister Lydia Abaga, a gospel singer who would become known to another generation as the mother of MI Abaga and Jesse Jagz. Another was Panam Percy Paul, who remains one of Nigeria’s most beloved gospel artists. The story matters not simply because of those names. It illustrates how an investment in skills, equipment, mentorship and creative community can produce economic and cultural dividends far beyond its original purpose.

It would be too simplistic to draw a straight line from one missionary studio to every Nigerian star who followed. Nigerian popular music has many roots: highlife, juju, fuji, Afrobeat, hip-hop, gospel, dancehall and the extraordinary energy of Lagos, Benin, Port Harcourt, Kaduna, and countless other cities. But Jos was an important node in the network. Its gospel and secular musicians, studios, producers and informal apprenticeship systems helped nurture an ecosystem associated with artists including MI Abaga, Jesse Jagz, Ice Prince, PSquare, Asa, and, in his formative years, 2Face Idibia—later 2Baba.

Twenty years ago, while living in Kenya, I heard 2Face’s “African Queen” on the radio for the first time. I remember thinking that something had shifted. Here was a Nigerian song with the confidence, production and emotional universality to travel across Africa and far beyond it. I knew Nigerian music was going somewhere. I had no idea how far.

Last night, that story came full circle. I watched 2Baba perform in Grand Rapids, Michigan—the very American community from which the missionary connection to Jos had emerged decades earlier. The concert took place at the new Ayo’s Place Events Centre in nearby Grandville, owned by Ademola Coker. Surrounded by dear friends and an enthusiastic audience, I was struck by the symmetry: a transatlantic exchange that had once helped build musical capacity in Jos was now being answered by Nigerian music drawing people together in West Michigan.

This is more than nostalgia. It is an economic story, and one that Nigerian policymakers, financiers and business leaders should take much more seriously.

Consider the scale. According to Spotify’s 2025 Loud & Clear disclosures, Nigerian artists generated more than ₦60 billion in royalties on that platform alone, associated with 30.3 billion streams and 1.6 billion listening hours. That compares with more than ₦25 billion in 2023 and ₦58 billion in 2024. These are royalties generated for rights holders, not necessarily the amounts paid into performers’ personal accounts, and Spotify is only one part of a much larger commercial landscape.

The real music economy includes concerts and touring, songwriting and publishing, sync licensing for films and advertising, brand partnerships, merchandising, management, studios, equipment, sound engineering, event production, hospitality, transport and digital services. A sold-out concert does not merely reward the headline act. It creates work for promoters, security teams, photographers, caterers, drivers, venue operators and local businesses. The Grandville concert offered a small but vivid illustration of this multiplier effect.

The diaspora is especially important. It provides audiences with purchasing power, creates demand for live events in cities that are not traditional entertainment capitals, and sustains venues and entrepreneurs who connect Nigerian culture to local markets. A Nigerian performer appearing in West Michigan is not a curiosity. It is evidence of a distribution network that now reaches deep into the global economy.

Yet, there is a paradox. Nigerian creativity has become a globally recognised brand even while the Nigerian economy struggles with electricity, foreign exchange volatility, financing costs, poorly negotiated contracts, and infrastructure deficits. Our artists have demonstrated an ability to compete internationally in ways that many of our traditional industries have not. They have built global demand for something unmistakably Nigerian without waiting for the country’s broader business environment to become ideal.

That success carries soft power. Music changes the way a country is imagined. Long before someone books a flight to Lagos, invests in a Nigerian company or buys a Nigerian fashion label, they may encounter Nigeria through a playlist, a dance challenge or a live performance. Burna Boy, Wizkid, Davido, Tems, Rema and many others have made Nigerian language, humour, style and rhythm familiar to audiences who might otherwise know the country only through troubling headlines. Nollywood, fashion, food and sport reinforce the effect.

Soft power is not the same as export revenue, but it can create the conditions for it. Cultural familiarity lowers psychological distance. It makes partnerships easier to imagine, stimulates tourism and hospitality, creates commercial opportunities for brands and can increase the visibility of Nigerian talent in entirely different sectors. Countries invest heavily in national branding campaigns; Nigerian musicians are building global brand recognition every day through the market itself.

But visibility is not value capture. Streaming is a case in point. The royalty value of a stream depends in part on the revenue generated in the listener’s market, and contracts determine how the proceeds are divided among artists, labels, publishers and other rights holders. A Nigerian hit can travel around the world while much of its intellectual property, distribution income or financing upside sits outside Nigeria. The central economic question is therefore not simply how many streams we generate, but how much durable wealth, ownership and employment we retain.

The policy agenda is practical. First, strengthen copyright enforcement, royalty collection and transparent metadata so creators are paid accurately. Second, expand access to patient, commercially disciplined financing for catalogues, venues, labels, production facilities and creative businesses, not just grants for celebrity projects. Third, invest in dependable power, affordable connectivity, performance spaces and technical training. Fourth, make it easier for Nigerian businesses to export services, receive payments and operate across borders. Finally, develop the professional infrastructure, lawyers, accountants, managers, agents and data specialists, that allows creative talent to become enduring enterprises.

We should also pay more attention to where ecosystems begin. The Jos story is a reminder that talent clusters rarely appear by magic or happen overnight. They grow from institutions, trusted mentors, places to rehearse, equipment people can access and networks that transmit skills from one generation to the next. The first beneficiaries may not look like future global stars. An investment made for gospel ministry can, decades later, help seed a broader creative economy. That is precisely why cultural infrastructure deserves to be treated as economic infrastructure.

It would be a mistake to imagine that the government can manufacture another 2Baba or Burna Boy by a new set of laws and regulations. Its role is to create the conditions in which thousands of talented Nigerians can experiment, own their work, reach markets and build businesses. The next global breakthrough may emerge from a modest studio in Jos, Kaduna, Enugu, Ibadan or Uyo, rather than from a high-profile initiative in Lagos or Abuja.

When I heard “African Queen” on Kenya radio two decades ago, I heard the beginning of something extraordinary. Watching 2Baba perform in Grand Rapids in 2026, I saw how extraordinary it had become. The circle from a CRCNA-linked music ministry in Jos to a Nigerian concert in West Michigan is personal, historical and profoundly economic.

Nigeria has already proved that its creativity can command the world’s attention. The challenge now is to build the institutions and businesses that ensure the world’s attention translates into lasting Nigerian prosperity. And I suspect the best is still to come.

Dr Wiebe Boer, Chief Growth Officer, JIPA Network, and Editorial Advisory Board Member, BusinessDay.