Kenneth Mugabi has opened up about the creative process behind his music, revealing how random thoughts, personal experiences and research eventually come together to form the stories in his songs.
The Ugandan soul singer, who is preparing for his upcoming concert, explained that songwriting often begins with simply observing the world around him and allowing ideas to develop before bringing them together.
“I sit alone and start writing random things, and then I put them together into a story,” Mugabi said.
For Mugabi, the process involves more than simply documenting his personal experiences. He said he also gathers information and conducts research before turning his thoughts into music.
That approach has been part of his songwriting journey since his university days, when he wrote several songs he now describes as being ahead of their time.
“There are songs I wrote while at campus. The music was very old, yet I was very young,” he explained.
Mugabi said the contrast between his age and the mature sound of his music sometimes made people perceive him as older than he actually was.
His explanation for that sound goes beyond the music itself. Mugabi said he deliberately avoided directly revealing what he was experiencing or what was happening around him.
Instead, he chose to communicate through riddles, legends and poetry.
“I didn’t want to show what I was going through or the things that were around, so I decided to use riddles, legends and poems. When you put such into the market where they don’t exist, people start thinking you’re very old.”
That creative choice became part of what distinguished his early songwriting, allowing him to tell stories without spelling out the personal circumstances behind them.
Now, as he prepares for his upcoming concert, Mugabi is offering listeners a glimpse into the thought process behind the music — a process that can begin with something as simple as a random thought before eventually becoming a complete story.
His songwriting philosophy also helps explain why Mugabi’s music has often carried a distinctly mature character, even when the artist himself was still young.