DAR ES SALAAM, Aug. 18 -- A FESTIVAL or concert is easy to understand from the audiences perspective.

There is a stage, music, food, crowds, sponsors and, eventually, the lights go out. But for the organisations behind such events, the calculation rarely ends with what happens during those few hours or days.

Increasingly, an event is becoming a platform for something much larger: Shaping perceptions, creating relationships, promoting destinations, strengthening brands and generating economic activity beyond the venue.

That is what makes the recent Kizimkazi Festival in Zanzibar and CRDBs IMBEJU Sauti Moja concert in Dar es Salaam particularly interesting.

They are very different events, but both raise the same question: What exactly a...