The African e-Journals Project has digitized full text of articles of eleven social science and humanities journals. This item is from the digital archive maintained by Michigan State University Library. Find more at: http://digital.lib.msu.edu/projects/africanjournals/ Available through a partnership with Scroll down to read the article. y^P ^i can Quarterly on the AtrsxVQtt Sprawling airections, Lggos is DODulatepopulated cify_ on the West African coc sCt'fyEven.thoug' h r ceased to be th<e_Dolitical capita ot Nigerig in 1, Lagos stil remains Jhe commercial hegrt- beat ot the cojuntry with mihabitaptl s drawn from vanpus parts orf NigeriNigeriaa and other nations ot ThThe world. ThiIn s cosmopolitan crowd.genergt.es a rather, yibrarpt^social,activity wni clu ing clubssuch as slan , Yoruba Tennis an g grnong othersth . An aggregatiatioon like Lsiand Clgb^for insfgncf wasw founded in. October 194 by g grouo ot patriotic anc eminent Nig.enans led by Adey.emo AlgKija who becarne the first chairman. Two maLor reasons were advanced for ine founding of the club. The. first was a desire to .provide a congenial atmosphere wher.e Nigerian el tes ot all ethnic shades could come t.ogether to discuss matters of imerest in 5ucn areas as commerce, industry, trade and. above .all, politics—areas that were then dominated by Europeans. The second was .to provide a conducive environment where politicians—-Nigerian and European.s alike—could relax. This was i.n po.in.ted contrast to the already existing Ikoy.i Club, which was notorious at the timi for .its. racially oreiudice* admission policy. All the club hpyave .theitheirr set objectives. Various night clubs, including Enchanting Chez Peters where Victor Olaiya GLENDORA REVIEWxAfrican Quarterly on the ArT5><V0I3@No2> performed in those days, Ambassador Hotel, Yaba, Cool of Lagos, former nexus of British colonial power in Nigeria, Cats Inn, Apapa Road, provided venues for social activity. home to a diverse population of indigenous and immigrant And, of course, there were local ceremonies that ranged peoples. And, like port towns everywhere, Lagos was a fertile from child naming, house warming, and birthday ground for the germination of hybrid musical forms. Although celebrations, to funeral events and chieftaincy title awards, contemporary juju music is specifically identified with, and many of which often called for partying. However, these social patronized by, the over fifteen million Yoruba of South-Western structures and settings have been fueled, sustained and Nigeria, its complex history reflects the intermixture of various activated over the years with juju, a musical genre whose African, Afro-American, European and middle Eastern-derived sociology is rooted deeply in the culture of Lagosians, as an materials. The period between World War I and World War entertainment vehicle. Fuji, a social music type with origin II saw the parallel development of guitar-based popular from the Muslim culture of South-Western Nigeria, has since music forms in Freetown, Monrovia, Accra, Lagos and other become popular in Lagos, having acquired a hard electro- towns along the coasts of West Africa. This cluster of urban rock edge with its African content being deliberately subjected traditions can be divided into two broad categories, each to Western influence. This is only a passing phase as it is a derived from a traditional type of musical context. The first is far cry from the original concept created in the seventies by the guitar-band highlife that involves adding one or more guitars to a traditional percussion ensemble. This type is _i HE origin of juju lies in the cosmopolitan economic center of Lagos, former nexus of British colonial power in Nigeria, home to a diverse population of indigenous and immigrant peoples. And, like port towns everywhere, Lagos was a fertile ground for the germination of hybrid musical forms Singing To The Gods, © Tarn Fiofori (photo on opening page) Agidigbo Player, 1960 (right). Apa/a Music pioneer and exponent, Haruna Iskola (Baba Ngani AgbaJ performing with his ensemble, ?975 (opposite page). two ex-servicemen-turned-musicians: Sikiru Ayinde Barrister social dance music. The second is a more personal "listening" and Kollington Ayinla. However, modern groups such as tradition, which is centered around a single performer the Wura Fadakas composed of young Lagosians keep accompanied by one or two of his listeners, playing on bottles, reminding Lagosians of the need to identify with the roots of cigarette tins or palm-wine calabashes struck with a nail or juju music as exemplified by the pioneers. And this is why knife blade. the hi-tech juju music of Yoruba superstars, King Sunny Ade and Chief Commander Ebenezer Obey, discovered and It is from the latter stream, often referred to as "palm-wine lauded by the American alternative popular music press in music" by older urban musicians, that juju emerged as a the early 1980s, is the product of some fifty years of continuous distinctively named style in about 1932. This was when Tunde experimentation by African urban musicians. King, widely recognized as the founder of juju music, formed The origin of juju lies in the cosmopolitan economic center his band with the release of his first recorded material, Eko Akete, on Parlophone record label in 1936. This first GlENDORA Quarterly on the AiS><V0I3@No8> appearance on disc bore the stylistic designation, juju, and onlookers, and not Tunde King himself, who gave the music introduced several innovations that defined the new genre. its name, which has stuck till today. Another etymological And from 1 932 onwards, Tunde King's group consisted of explanation for the application of the term juju is tied to the four musicians. There was the leader on the six-stringed guitar concept of religion. It is suggested by older musicians that banjo and vocals. Then there were a tambourine (juju) player, juju, a word used by disapproving Europeans and a sekere (traditional gourd rattle) player, and a second vocalist Westernized Africans to refer to indigenous religion, was who occasionally doubled on western cymbals or triangle — satirically applied by the Yoruba to predominant Western a format copied by other groups in Lagos, particularly after features of the new style, such as the tambourine, cymbals, the release of Tunde's 1 936 record referred to as "faaji" triangle and harmonic patterns derived from Christian hymns. which means "pleasure". Tunde's music was usually on the However, the first explanation is a more logically acceptable medium tempo. And listening to him was like giving attention probability. The formula for King's success and the ability to to a preacher because his music had a strong moral content: adapt to the new musical style lay in the diversity of juju's exhortation, advice, and words of wisdom, from which people audience at the time. Performing at urban bars or hotels usually drew and learnt beneficial lessons. and new traditional ceremonies —(child naming ceremonies The origin and history of the term juju as a musical style and wedding funerals among these)—juju groups had, at * *~ • MifL Wk i1 are traceable to the tambourine as an instrument. Tunde various times, to satisfy the demands of Yoruba clerical King himself was quoted as saying that he bought a workers, librarians, Ghanaians, and West Indian sailors, tambourine from the Salvation Army Stores and gave it to rich Muslim Yoruba traders, and members of the Saro his "samba" drummer who developed a virtuoso technique Westernized elite. which involved tossing the tambourine high into the air and King's 1936 recorded works for instance included in their catching it. Yoruba is rich in sound imagery and the motion instrumentation, violin and dulcitone, strange instruments of the tambourine was described by onlookers as "ju-ju" which he never used in live performances. The use of these (low tone-high tone), a term subsequently extended to the instruments was obviously suggested by the German style as a whole. The Yoruba word for "throw" is "ju." recording technicians who also played the role of producers. Duplicated with tonal accent, it became juju. Thus it was the This clearly demonstrates the heterogeneity of King's audience. •GLENDORA KEVXWNxAfrican Quarterly on the Ans><V0I3@No2> However, this is not to say that music began as an Nigerian nationalists, supported the legal rights of traditional 1 entertainment vehicle for Lagosians only in the 1930s with drummers, and introduced elements of Sierra Leonean Creole the advent of Tunde King's juju. The process of this musical syncretic music to the Lagos scene. A more amorphous group culture dates back to the previous century and was influenced that was crucial in the process of cultural cross-fertilization by the specific cultural backgrounds of the various immigrant between Lagos and other port towns in Africa, Europe and settlers and their various locations. Indigenous Yoruba the Americas, was the transient population of African and communities in the crowded Isale Eko area of Lagos Island, West Indian wage laborers employed by shipping lines and as well as groups of Yoruba settlers from Ijebu Ode and the rail road system. These cosmopolitan individuals were Ibadan patronized a wide range of musical types. These frequent patrons of the night spots along the Lagos Marina. included performances by street musicians and the complex There, they introduced variety and expanded the scope of percussion ensemble music attracted to naming ceremonies, the music. Songs in various languages such as Kru, Akan, weddings, funerals, and religious festivals. Two groups of Fanti, Ga, Igbo, Efik and Ijaw were added, just as were such repatriated Yoruba who had settled in Lagos in the nineteenth Afro-American popular musical styles: ragtime, calypso and century also contributed to the city's diverse musical culture.