Onwuegbuna, I. E. (2010). Urbanization and African Pop Music: The Nigerian Experience. Awka Journal of Research in Music and the Arts, Vol. 7, pp.161-173. Published by the Department of Music, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka. Urbanization and African pop music: The Nigerian experience By: Ikenna Emmanuel Onwuegbuna Department of Music, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Enugu State. E-mail: [email protected] Cell: +2348035639139 Abstract African popular music, as an acculturative product of the African folk music, can be scrutinized along the lines of musical and social processes as inseparable pair in developing the various genres of this eclectic musical form. In Nigeria, it is the congruent collaboration of creativity and politico-socio-economic activities of the mid-1940s (the period following the World War II) that have evolved the various genres of popular music of the land—a process that is still in being! The social processes that span through the diverse fields of economics, politics, linguistics, sociology, philosophy, and religion make up a manifold agency of acculturation, commercialization, urbanization, and class stratifications. These processes then carried over into a parallel development of a neo-folk form that became popular. The popularity of this new form is due to a socio-musical interchange that is both structural and functional. The primary research process of survey method was backed-up with historical and descriptive methods to unearth the leaning on the rhythm of social life by pop musicians to develop the African popular musical genres and sub-genres—especially in Nigeria. Preamble Urbanization and industrialization, the offshoots of 19th century global modernization, and territorial expansion for commercialization of the excess products of some rich and powerful European nations, are responsible for the disruption of traditional attitudes and lifestyles of the poorer African nations. Different ethnic groups migrated to the urban centres to form a stratified society based on socio-economic status. This new social order differed widely from the former homogeneous ethnic settings. In expressing their musical artistry, these urban dwellers, drawn from different ethnic backgrounds, created a syncretic urban neo-folk music that are regarded as Interethnic pop styles. However, most of these styles are modifications and transformations of earlier ethnic styles that were taken to the urban centres. Trade in black slaves across the Atlantic, which started as far back as the 15th century, is responsible for the relocation of Africans who exported the rich cultures of Africa to America Onwuegbuna, I. E. (2010). Urbanization and African Pop Music: The Nigerian Experience. Awka Journal of Research in Music and the Arts, Vol. 7, pp.161-173. Published by the Department of Music, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka. and the rest of the world. Religious songs, work songs, dance songs, street cries, ballads, and sorrow songs of these slaves found new expressions when these African slaves performed them on Western musical instruments. The new form of music developed out of this practice then became a hybrid of African and Western musical elements. In this hybrid are all forms of what came to be known as African-American pop music. They include jazz, blues, gospel, soul, disco, funk, rock, reggae, calypso, rhythm ‘n’ blues, rap, etc. Through the agency of radio, gramophone, cinema, and other technology-backed media, these pop genres found their way into Africa. The response of the African audience and musicians to these ‘new’ forms was positive. The positive response was informed by the under-currents of the musical contents that are clearly African; and in this response, the African musicians started creating African versions of the new pop music. Not only did they re-interpret these pop styles in their own African sense of musical performance—thereby creating a cross-current, they went further to develop their own urban neo-folk styles, using available Western musical instruments at their disposal. In this practice, International Afropop styles emerged. However, those professionally crafted by African musicians still carry their original names, even though they are globally consumed. Overall, the contemporary African popular music resulted from the political, social, and economic environment of the late 18th to early 19th centuries, and is consolidated by the dramatic transformations brought about by urbanization in the period after World War II. In Nigeria, the Igbo are known for such ethnic pop styles as igede, nkpọkịtị, atịlọgwụ, nkwa-nwite, nkwa- ụmụagbọghọ, and egwu amala. The Hausa perform rokon fada, boorii, and asauwara, while the Yoruba have numerous styles including waka, sakara, and ere-ege. Some of Nigeria’s interethnic pop styles include juju, fuji, akụkọ n’egwu, ịkwọkịrịkwọ, kalangu, and dadakuada. A number of the African-American invented styles that have received some African touches are today found in the international music markets, often with the prefix—Afro. They include Afro- funk, Afro-reggae, Afro-jazz, Afro-hip hop, Afro-rock, Afro-calypso, Afro-disco, Afro-soul, etc. Those professionally crafted by African musicians include highlife, Afrobeat, juju, fuji, Yo-pop, soukous, makossa, mapouka, zouk, kwaito, kwai-hop, kwasa-kwasa, hip-life, raï, morna, benga, and taarab. Others are jiti, mbaqanga, jive, mbalax, sega, yetu, bongo-flava, and chimurenga (Africa Sounds, 2009; Afropop, 2009; Agawu, 2003; Amazon, 2009; Britannica, 2009; Broughton, 1994; Collins, 1996; Ekwueme, 2004; Encarta, 2010; Ewens, 1991; National Geographic, 2009; Nketia, 1982; Okafor, 2005; Onwuegbuna, 2009; Palmberg & Kirkegaard, 2002). Introduction Onwuegbuna, I. E. (2010). Urbanization and African Pop Music: The Nigerian Experience. Awka Journal of Research in Music and the Arts, Vol. 7, pp.161-173. Published by the Department of Music, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka. How musical is the African? This has hardly been the question. The musical consciousness of the African and the popularity of this phenomenon are supported by Ewens (1991) who asserts: The idea of Africa without music is unthinkable. However modern the interpretation, African pop is rooted in a musical continuum that accompanies every formal and informal moment of life… (p.8). Often, when African pop music is discussed, attention is riveted on those styles with overt elements borrowed from the Euro-American practices; such elements as triadic harmonic principles, diatonic and chromatic scales, as well as foreign musical instruments like the guitar, the brass and the reed families, the keyboard, and the trap drums. But it remains a fact that African pop music has existed ages before the 15th century, when the Portuguese seamen forayed into Africa for the prospects of commerce. The known popular music of Africa at the time existed (as it still does) as ethnic entertainment forms, combining songs, dances, drama, visual arts, and oral literature in folk languages and expressions. They include ifo, ere-ege, and rokon fada of Nigeria; ngoso, bantowbol, and mangambe of Cameroon; omutibo, nyatiti, and tarabu of Kenya; mbube, marabi, and maskanda of South Africa; and thakt, fiquah, and saiyidi of Egypt. Culture contacts among different ethnic groups in Africa started with migrations, inter-ethnic trades, and inter-communal wars; and consolidated by urbanization through the agency of Western colonization. Through these processes, the interethnic pop styles emerged. They are fusions of divergent elements from various ethnic practices. Some forms of this style include fuji of Nigeria, kpanlogo of Ghana, taarab of Tanzania, sembe of Angola, and shaabi of Algeria. However, those African pop styles with overt Western influences need little or no introduction; due to their global presence and acceptance, they have been classified as international pop styles of Africa. They include highlife, soukous, makossa, Zulu jive, and rai. It is indeed more factual than farcical that wherever there is musical sound, there is the African. Music accompanies the African from the womb to the tomb. Herodotus, the world acclaimed Father of History (485-425 BC), credited Libyan women singers with the gift of the ability to utter great sweet cries. Yet, European historians ignored an in-depth study of Africa and her rich musical culture until the discovery of the Rosetta stone in Egypt, in 1799, by Champollion. Much of what is known today as the history of ancient Africa is provided by archaeologists and Portuguese voyagers (Buah, 1969). Onwuegbuna, I. E. (2010). Urbanization and African Pop Music: The Nigerian Experience. Awka Journal of Research in Music and the Arts, Vol. 7, pp.161-173. Published by the Department of Music, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka. Sadie (1980) reports that the use of the bow as a musical instrument has been the practice in Africa for some 15,000 years; and that the thumb-piano has existed in Southern Africa, in its fully developed form, in 1586. According to him, the 16th and 17th century Nigerian bronze castings depict instruments and musicians playing several bells and rattles made of bronze and ivory. Exploration of Africa began sporadically in the mediaeval ages, while the virile scramble for and desecration of the land came with the incursions of the Portuguese seamen in the 15th century. Formal and systematized music education has been in existence in its traditional formats in Africa long before the Western system of education was introduced via colonization.