10-15-2018, 07:19 AM
Fela Anikulapo Kuti (15 October 1938 – 2 August
1997), also professionally known as Fela Kuti, or
simply Fela, was a Nigerian multi-
instrumentalist, musician, composer, pioneer of
the Afrobeat music genre and human rights
activist. He has been called "superstar, singer,
musician, Panafricanist, polygamist, mystic,
legend." At the height of his popularity, he was
referred to as one of Africa's most "challenging
and charismatic music performers."
Political views and activism
Activism
Fela Kuti was a political giant in Africa from the
70s until his death. Kuti criticized the corruption
of Nigerian government officials and the
mistreatment of Nigerian citizens. He spoke of
colonialism as the root of the socio-economic
and political problems that plagued the African
people. Corruption was one of the worst, if not
the worst, political problem facing Africa in the
70s and Nigeria was among the most corrupt
countries of the time. The Nigerian government
was responsible for election rigging and coups
that ultimately worsened poverty, economic
inequality, unemployment, and political
instability, which further promoted corruption
and thuggery. Fela's protest songs covered
themes inspired by the realities of corruption
and socio-economic inequality in Africa. Fela
Kuti's political statements could be heard
throughout Africa.
Kuti's open vocalization of the violent and
oppressive regime controlling Nigeria didn't
come without consequence. He was arrested on
over 200 different occasions, including his
longest stint of 20 months after his arrest in
1984. On top of the jail time, the corrupt
government would send soldiers to beat Kuti,
his family and friends, and destroy wherever he
lived and whatever instruments or recordings he
had.
In the 1970s, Kuti began to run outspoken
political columns in the advertising space of
daily and weekly newspapers such as The Daily
Times and The Punch, bypassing editorial
censorship in Nigeria's predominantly state
controlled media. Published throughout the
1970s and early 1980s under the title "Chief
Priest Say", these columns were extensions of
Kuti's famous Yabi Sessions—consciousness-
raising word-sound rituals, with himself as chief
priest, conducted at his Lagos nightclub.
Organized around a militantly Afrocentric
rendering of history and the essence of black
beauty, "Chief Priest Say" focused on the role of
cultural hegemony in the continuing subjugation
of Africans. Kuti addressed a number of topics,
from explosive denunciations of the Nigerian
Government's criminal behaviour; Islam and
Christianity's exploitative nature, and evil
multinational corporations; to deconstructions of
Western medicine, Black Muslims, sex, pollution,
and poverty. "Chief Priest Say" was cancelled,
first by Daily Times then by Punch. The reason
given was non-payment, but many
commentators[who?] have speculated that the
papers' editors were increasingly pressured to
stop publication, including by violence.
Political views
"Imagine Che Guevara and Bob Marley rolled
into one person and you get a sense of Nigerian
musician and activist Fela Kuti."
—Herald Sun, February 2011
Kuti was outspoken; his songs spoke his inner
thoughts. His rise in popularity throughout the
1970s signaled a change in the relation between
music as an art form and Nigerian socio-political
discourse.[30] In 1984 Anikulapo harshly
criticized and insulted the then authoritarian
president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,
Muhammadu Buhari. One of his popular songs,
"Beast Of No Nation", refers to Buhari as an
animal in a madman's body; in Nigerian Pidgin:
"No be outside Buhari dey ee, na krase man be
dat, animal in krase man skin ii". Kuti strongly
believed in Africa and always preached peace
among Africans. He thought the most important
way for Africans to fight European cultural
imperialism was to support traditional African
religions and lifestyles. The American Black
Power movement also influenced Fela's political
views; he supported Pan-Africanism and
socialism, and called for a united, democratic
African Republic. Some of the famous African
leaders he supported during his lifetime include
Kwame Nkrumah and Thomas Sankara of
Burkina Faso. Kuti was a candid supporter of
human rights, and many of his songs are direct
attacks against dictatorships, specifically the
militaristic governments of Nigeria in the 1970s
and 1980s. He was also a social commentator,
and he criticized his fellow Africans (especially
the upper class) for betraying traditional African
culture.
The African culture he believed in also included
men having many wives (polygamy). The
Kalakuta Republic was formed in part as a
polygamist colony. In defense of polygyny he
said: "A man goes for many women in the first
place. Like in Europe, when a man is married,
when the wife is sleeping, he goes out and
bleeps around. He should bring the women in
the house, man, to live with him, and stop
running around the streets!" Some characterize
his views towards women as misogynist, and
typically cite as evidence songs like "Mattress".
In a more complex example, he mocks the
aspiration of African women to European
standards of ladyhood while extolling the values
of the market woman in his song "Lady". In
accordance with his beliefs, Fela Kuti married
multiple women at the same time in 1978.
Fela Kuti was also an outspoken critic of
America. At a meeting during his 1981
Amsterdam tour, he "complained about the
psychological warfare that American
organizations like ITT and the CIA waged
against developing nations in terms of
language" He did not see why the terms 'Third
World, "undeveloped" or even worse, "Non-
aligned countries" should be used, as they all
implied inferiority."
Legacy
Since Fela's death in 1997, there has been a
revival of his influence in music and popular
culture, culminating in another re-release of his
catalog controlled by Universal Music, Broadway
and off-Broadway biographically based shows,
and new bands, such as Antibalas, who carry
the Afrobeat banner to a new generation of
listeners.
In 1999, Universal Music France, under the aegis
of Francis Kertekian, remastered the 45 albums
that it controlled, and released them on 26
compact discs. These titles were licensed to
countries of the world, except Nigeria and Japan,
where Fela's music was controlled by other
companies. In 2005, Universal Music USA
licensed all of its world-music titles to the UK-
based label Wrasse Records, which repackaged
the same 26 CDs for distribution in the USA
(replacing the MCA-issued titles there) and the
UK. In 2009, Universal created a new deal for
the USA with Knitting Factory Records and for
Europe with PIAS, which included the release of
the Fela! Broadway cast album. In 2013, FKO Ltd,
the entity that owned the rights of all of Fela's
compositions, was acquired by BMG Rights
Management.
In 2003, an exhibition in the New Museum for
Contemporary Art, New York, titled The Black
President Exhibition, debuted and featured
concerts, symposia, films, and the works of 39
international artists.
Thomas McCarthy's 2008 film The Visitor
depicted a disconnected professor (Oscar
nominee Richard Jenkins) who wanted to play
the djembe. He learns from a young Syrian
(Haaz Sleiman) who tells the professor he will
never truly understand African music unless he
listens to Fela. The film features clips of Fela's
"Open and Close" and "Je'nwi Temi (Don't Gag
Me)".
In 2008, an off-Broadway production of Fela
Kuti's life entitled Fela!, inspired by Carlos
Moore's 1982 book Fela, Fela! This Bitch of a Life,
began with a collaborative workshop between
the Afrobeat band Antibalas and Tony award-
winner Bill T. Jones. The show was a massive
success, selling out shows during its run, and
garnering much critical acclaim. On 22
November 2009, Fela! began a run on Broadway
at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre. Jim Lewis helped
co-write the play (along with Bill T. Jones), and
obtained producer backing from Jay-Z and Will
Smith, among others. On 4 May 2010, Fela! was
nominated for 11 Tony Awards, including Best
Musical, Best Book of a Musical, Best Direction of
a Musical for Bill T. Jones, Best Leading Actor in a
Musical for Sahr Ngaujah, and Best Featured
Actress in a Musical for Lillias White. In 2011 the
London production of Fela! was made into a
film. On 11 June 2012, it was announced that
FELA! would return to Broadway for 32
performances.
On 18 August 2009, award-winning DJ J.Period
released a free mixtape to the general public via
his website that was a collaboration with
Somali-born hip-hop artist K'naan paying tribute
to Fela, Bob Marley and Bob Dylan, entitled The
Messengers.
In October 2009, Knitting Factory Records began
the process of re-releasing the 45 titles that
Universal Music controls, starting with yet
another re-release of the compilation The Best
of the Black President in the USA. The rest were
expected to be released in 2010.[needs update]
Fela Son of Kuti: The Fall of Kalakuta is a stage
play written by Onyekaba Cornel Best in 2010.
It has had successful acclaims in 2010 as part of
that year's Felabration celebration and returned
in 2014 at the National Theatre and Freedom
Park in Lagos. The play deals with events in a
hideout a day after the fall of Kalakuta.
Fela Kuti is remembered as an influential icon
who was brave enough to boldly voice his
opinions on matters that affected the nation
through his music. An annual festival
"Felabration" held each year to celebrate the life
of this music legend and his birthday.
The full-length documentary film Finding Fela,
directed by Alex Gibney, received its premiere at
the 2014 Sundance Film Festival.
In addition, a movie by Focus Features, directed
by Steve McQueen and written by Biyi Bandele,
about the life of Fela Kuti was rumoured to be
in production 2010, with Chiwetel Ejiofor in the
lead role, but has not eventuated.
Source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fela_Kuti
1997), also professionally known as Fela Kuti, or
simply Fela, was a Nigerian multi-
instrumentalist, musician, composer, pioneer of
the Afrobeat music genre and human rights
activist. He has been called "superstar, singer,
musician, Panafricanist, polygamist, mystic,
legend." At the height of his popularity, he was
referred to as one of Africa's most "challenging
and charismatic music performers."
Political views and activism
Activism
Fela Kuti was a political giant in Africa from the
70s until his death. Kuti criticized the corruption
of Nigerian government officials and the
mistreatment of Nigerian citizens. He spoke of
colonialism as the root of the socio-economic
and political problems that plagued the African
people. Corruption was one of the worst, if not
the worst, political problem facing Africa in the
70s and Nigeria was among the most corrupt
countries of the time. The Nigerian government
was responsible for election rigging and coups
that ultimately worsened poverty, economic
inequality, unemployment, and political
instability, which further promoted corruption
and thuggery. Fela's protest songs covered
themes inspired by the realities of corruption
and socio-economic inequality in Africa. Fela
Kuti's political statements could be heard
throughout Africa.
Kuti's open vocalization of the violent and
oppressive regime controlling Nigeria didn't
come without consequence. He was arrested on
over 200 different occasions, including his
longest stint of 20 months after his arrest in
1984. On top of the jail time, the corrupt
government would send soldiers to beat Kuti,
his family and friends, and destroy wherever he
lived and whatever instruments or recordings he
had.
In the 1970s, Kuti began to run outspoken
political columns in the advertising space of
daily and weekly newspapers such as The Daily
Times and The Punch, bypassing editorial
censorship in Nigeria's predominantly state
controlled media. Published throughout the
1970s and early 1980s under the title "Chief
Priest Say", these columns were extensions of
Kuti's famous Yabi Sessions—consciousness-
raising word-sound rituals, with himself as chief
priest, conducted at his Lagos nightclub.
Organized around a militantly Afrocentric
rendering of history and the essence of black
beauty, "Chief Priest Say" focused on the role of
cultural hegemony in the continuing subjugation
of Africans. Kuti addressed a number of topics,
from explosive denunciations of the Nigerian
Government's criminal behaviour; Islam and
Christianity's exploitative nature, and evil
multinational corporations; to deconstructions of
Western medicine, Black Muslims, sex, pollution,
and poverty. "Chief Priest Say" was cancelled,
first by Daily Times then by Punch. The reason
given was non-payment, but many
commentators[who?] have speculated that the
papers' editors were increasingly pressured to
stop publication, including by violence.
Political views
"Imagine Che Guevara and Bob Marley rolled
into one person and you get a sense of Nigerian
musician and activist Fela Kuti."
—Herald Sun, February 2011
Kuti was outspoken; his songs spoke his inner
thoughts. His rise in popularity throughout the
1970s signaled a change in the relation between
music as an art form and Nigerian socio-political
discourse.[30] In 1984 Anikulapo harshly
criticized and insulted the then authoritarian
president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,
Muhammadu Buhari. One of his popular songs,
"Beast Of No Nation", refers to Buhari as an
animal in a madman's body; in Nigerian Pidgin:
"No be outside Buhari dey ee, na krase man be
dat, animal in krase man skin ii". Kuti strongly
believed in Africa and always preached peace
among Africans. He thought the most important
way for Africans to fight European cultural
imperialism was to support traditional African
religions and lifestyles. The American Black
Power movement also influenced Fela's political
views; he supported Pan-Africanism and
socialism, and called for a united, democratic
African Republic. Some of the famous African
leaders he supported during his lifetime include
Kwame Nkrumah and Thomas Sankara of
Burkina Faso. Kuti was a candid supporter of
human rights, and many of his songs are direct
attacks against dictatorships, specifically the
militaristic governments of Nigeria in the 1970s
and 1980s. He was also a social commentator,
and he criticized his fellow Africans (especially
the upper class) for betraying traditional African
culture.
The African culture he believed in also included
men having many wives (polygamy). The
Kalakuta Republic was formed in part as a
polygamist colony. In defense of polygyny he
said: "A man goes for many women in the first
place. Like in Europe, when a man is married,
when the wife is sleeping, he goes out and
bleeps around. He should bring the women in
the house, man, to live with him, and stop
running around the streets!" Some characterize
his views towards women as misogynist, and
typically cite as evidence songs like "Mattress".
In a more complex example, he mocks the
aspiration of African women to European
standards of ladyhood while extolling the values
of the market woman in his song "Lady". In
accordance with his beliefs, Fela Kuti married
multiple women at the same time in 1978.
Fela Kuti was also an outspoken critic of
America. At a meeting during his 1981
Amsterdam tour, he "complained about the
psychological warfare that American
organizations like ITT and the CIA waged
against developing nations in terms of
language" He did not see why the terms 'Third
World, "undeveloped" or even worse, "Non-
aligned countries" should be used, as they all
implied inferiority."
Legacy
Since Fela's death in 1997, there has been a
revival of his influence in music and popular
culture, culminating in another re-release of his
catalog controlled by Universal Music, Broadway
and off-Broadway biographically based shows,
and new bands, such as Antibalas, who carry
the Afrobeat banner to a new generation of
listeners.
In 1999, Universal Music France, under the aegis
of Francis Kertekian, remastered the 45 albums
that it controlled, and released them on 26
compact discs. These titles were licensed to
countries of the world, except Nigeria and Japan,
where Fela's music was controlled by other
companies. In 2005, Universal Music USA
licensed all of its world-music titles to the UK-
based label Wrasse Records, which repackaged
the same 26 CDs for distribution in the USA
(replacing the MCA-issued titles there) and the
UK. In 2009, Universal created a new deal for
the USA with Knitting Factory Records and for
Europe with PIAS, which included the release of
the Fela! Broadway cast album. In 2013, FKO Ltd,
the entity that owned the rights of all of Fela's
compositions, was acquired by BMG Rights
Management.
In 2003, an exhibition in the New Museum for
Contemporary Art, New York, titled The Black
President Exhibition, debuted and featured
concerts, symposia, films, and the works of 39
international artists.
Thomas McCarthy's 2008 film The Visitor
depicted a disconnected professor (Oscar
nominee Richard Jenkins) who wanted to play
the djembe. He learns from a young Syrian
(Haaz Sleiman) who tells the professor he will
never truly understand African music unless he
listens to Fela. The film features clips of Fela's
"Open and Close" and "Je'nwi Temi (Don't Gag
Me)".
In 2008, an off-Broadway production of Fela
Kuti's life entitled Fela!, inspired by Carlos
Moore's 1982 book Fela, Fela! This Bitch of a Life,
began with a collaborative workshop between
the Afrobeat band Antibalas and Tony award-
winner Bill T. Jones. The show was a massive
success, selling out shows during its run, and
garnering much critical acclaim. On 22
November 2009, Fela! began a run on Broadway
at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre. Jim Lewis helped
co-write the play (along with Bill T. Jones), and
obtained producer backing from Jay-Z and Will
Smith, among others. On 4 May 2010, Fela! was
nominated for 11 Tony Awards, including Best
Musical, Best Book of a Musical, Best Direction of
a Musical for Bill T. Jones, Best Leading Actor in a
Musical for Sahr Ngaujah, and Best Featured
Actress in a Musical for Lillias White. In 2011 the
London production of Fela! was made into a
film. On 11 June 2012, it was announced that
FELA! would return to Broadway for 32
performances.
On 18 August 2009, award-winning DJ J.Period
released a free mixtape to the general public via
his website that was a collaboration with
Somali-born hip-hop artist K'naan paying tribute
to Fela, Bob Marley and Bob Dylan, entitled The
Messengers.
In October 2009, Knitting Factory Records began
the process of re-releasing the 45 titles that
Universal Music controls, starting with yet
another re-release of the compilation The Best
of the Black President in the USA. The rest were
expected to be released in 2010.[needs update]
Fela Son of Kuti: The Fall of Kalakuta is a stage
play written by Onyekaba Cornel Best in 2010.
It has had successful acclaims in 2010 as part of
that year's Felabration celebration and returned
in 2014 at the National Theatre and Freedom
Park in Lagos. The play deals with events in a
hideout a day after the fall of Kalakuta.
Fela Kuti is remembered as an influential icon
who was brave enough to boldly voice his
opinions on matters that affected the nation
through his music. An annual festival
"Felabration" held each year to celebrate the life
of this music legend and his birthday.
The full-length documentary film Finding Fela,
directed by Alex Gibney, received its premiere at
the 2014 Sundance Film Festival.
In addition, a movie by Focus Features, directed
by Steve McQueen and written by Biyi Bandele,
about the life of Fela Kuti was rumoured to be
in production 2010, with Chiwetel Ejiofor in the
lead role, but has not eventuated.
Source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fela_Kuti