Black diasporic encounters: a study of the music of Fela Sowande.

Fela Sowande is now generally acknowledged as the most important twentieth-century West African composer of concert music and performer of jazz. Born in Oyo, western Nigeria, in March 1905, he went to London in 1934 and enrolled as an external candidate at the University of London and the Royal College of Music. He was one of the most notable figures on the black diaspora music scene in London in the first half of the twentieth century. He returned to Nigeria in 1953 and worked there until 1968, when he immigrated to the United States and taught at a number of colleges, including Howard University and Kent State University. He remained in the United States until his death in 1987. (1) The centennial anniversary of his birth was marked in 2005 with various activities in Europe, the United States, and Nigeria, signaling a rekindling of interest in his works. (2)

Three salient features define Sowande's work as a composer and a performer. First, many of his works are based on folk songs. He identified important similarities between African folk songs and Negro spirituals, even though these two genres speak to different human experiences. He drew attention to such similarities by using the two categories of songs as thematic material in many of his compositions. Second, his work as a performer was typified by a sustained collaboration with black musicians from the United States and the Caribbean and by the promotion of African and African-American music. In the 1930s and 1940s, for example, he was a jazz pianist, Hammond organist, and director of some of the best jazz groups in London. (3) His promotion of black music continued in the United States, where he gave a series of concerts performing his own compositions. Third, his arrangements of Negro spirituals and his interaction with black musicians from the diaspora illustrate his fascination for incorporating musical materials from different cultures into his compositions. Kimberlin and Euba (1992, 3) have used the term interculturalism to describe the works of African composers like Sowande in which "elements from two or more cultures are integrated." According to them, the composer or performer "of this music usually belongs to one of the cultures from which the elements are derived." For Sowande, the world is a borderless cultural space within which there are numerous possibilities for intercultural compositional and performance activities.

Sowande's work has received attention by a number of scholars. In Nigerian Art Music (Omojola 1995), for example, I provide a detailed study of his Folk Symphony. Sadoh (2004) focuses on Sowande's organ works. In addition, a book titled African Art Music in Nigeria (Omibiyi-Obidike 2001) is devoted exclusively to the life and works of Sowande. My essay in that volume examines some of his organ works (Omojola 2001). Other scholars who have examined Sowande's organ works include Hildreth (1978), Laidman (1989), and Munday (1992). Despite the importance of these various studies, the significance of Sowande's work as an African composer and performer who worked with black diaspora musical elements and collaborated with black musicians from different parts of the world has yet to be fully explored. (4)

In this article, I discuss Sowande's composing and performing career, focusing on how he was motivated by a desire to promote encounter and dialogue and to reinforce a sense of common identity among black populations from different parts of the world. (5) The encounter that is promoted through his performances and compositions reflects what I would refer to as a pan-African philosophy that is congruent with the goals of the pan-African movement of the early part of the twentieth century. The pan-African movement, which was guided by such leaders as Kwame Nkrumah and Marcus Garvey, was motivated by the need to unite and mobilize black peoples from different parts of the world toward the attainment of freedom from racial discrimination and colonialism. Many of Sowande's musical performances in London in the 1930s and 1940s were part of the activities of the pan-African movement in the city. I concentrate here mainly on his career in England in the 1930s and 1940s, his performance tour of the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and selections from his arrangements of Negro spirituals. I draw on his views on African music and culture and briefly explain how the colonial experience in Africa helped to shape the nature of his musical career. My discussion relies on Sowande's writings, newspapers dating to the 1930s, his scores and recordings, an extended field work in Nigeria, and on interviews that I conducted with some of his former students here in the United States. (6) My brief discussion of his orchestral works situates his arrangements of Negro spirituals within the larger context of his intercultural compositional style. As a background to this study, one must also look at certain central issues about black musical aesthetics and the relationship between African and African-American musical traditions.

Black Aesthetics in Music

The relationship between the musical traditions of continental Africa and those of the black diaspora derives from ancestral connections. In the view of many writers, despite the many years of separation and the geographical distance between these two regions, the kinship between their musical traditions remains strong. Thus, although each tradition has developed within the specific context of its cultural environment, they are united and distinguished by a body of stylistic elements. With regard to African-American music, Melville Herskovits (1941), Richard Waterman (1952), and William Tallmadge (1984) have justified this position and acknowledged the African roots of African-American music, even though African-American culture has developed its unique identity as shaped by its North American cultural and political environment. The discussions by these scholars reflect an identity debate that has continued to typify the discourse of African-American music. Critical to that discourse is the evaluation of African-American music in terms of its relationship to traditional African music on the one hand and European music on the other. This trend of discourse can be further observed in the contributions of James Weldon Johnson and Rosamund Johnson (1925), Harold Courlander (1963), and Amiri Baraka (1963).

Charles Keil, for example, has advanced a diachronic dimension to the discussion on the engagement between European and African forms in African-American music. In outlining the historical development of African-American forms since the beginning of the twentieth century, he observes a constant dialectic between the forces of change and retention. This progression, which he describes as "appropriation-revitalization process," maps out a historical and stylistic trajectory within which newer forms of African-American music are typified by an increasing affinity toward African forms (Keil 1991, 43-48). The development of bebop by Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie in the 1940s and the emergence of free jazz in the works of Ornette Coleman and John Coltrane, he argues, represented attempts to restore the centrality of the African-American blues idioms in jazz, in response to the increasing European appropriation of jazz. Thus, as Jackson (2003, 27) has observed, the greater emphasis on syncopation, horizontal approach to rhythmic figuration, melodic angularity, strong percussiveness, improvisation, and other "ring-centered values" (see Floyd 1999, 136-139) represents attempts by these musicians to revive the ailing African identity in jazz.

In explaining the relationship between African and African-American musical traditions, writers like Sterling Stuckey and Samuel Floyd have focused on the significance of the ring shout as a performance and religious space within which many of the defining features of black musical traditions were established and practiced in the United States. The ring shout refers to circular performances associated with social and religious activities that originated in Africa. It is the context within which story-telling sessions, religious worship, and informal education take place (Stuckey 1987, in Floyd 1999, 136). African slaves continued this practice in the United States. According to Stuckey, features that distinguish black musical activities and that are associated with the ring shout include call-and-response patterns, polyrhythms, embellishing wordless phrases known as vocables, grunts, parallel intervals, and repetitive rhythmic patterns (138). These stylistic elements continue to distinguish many African-American musical idioms, including spirituals, jazz, and gospel. Supporting Stuckey's observation, Floyd has observed that "since all of the defining elements of black music are present in the ring, Stuckey's formulation can be seen as a frame in which all black music analysis and interpretation can take place--a formulation that can confirm the importance of the performance practices crucial to black musical expressions" (138-139).

Waterman (1952) and Nketia (2005) have also discussed the importance of these same features in uniting African and African-American musical traditions. As I will explain later, Sowande's arrangements of Negro spirituals are distinguished by the use of virtually all of these features. Significantly, these elements also appear prominently in Sowande's musical compositions that are specifically designed to evoke indigenous African musical practices. The use of the same features in the two categories underlines the similarity between Sowande's understanding of the relationship between Africa and African-American music and the views of the scholars mentioned above.

Sowande's Views on African and African-American Musical Traditions

Sowande understood African and African-American music traditions as different components of a global tradition of black music. In describing the similarity between Yoruba songs from Nigeria and Negro spirituals, for example, he stated that, "to me they feel like two sides of the same coin" ("Nigerian Talks" 1962). He observed further that close research should reveal that Negro spirituals "partake of African music rather than Western music" ("Nigerian Talks" 1962). Explaining his approach to the use of African and African-American elements in his compositions, he stated that "the aim is to fuse European forms with one aspect or another of Nigerian, African or Afro-American music" (Sowande 1965, 32). As a scholar and a teacher, Sowande continued to stress the interrelatedness of black cultural traditions from different parts of the world, as well as the need to continue fostering that relationship. In a 1970 lecture titled "The Africanization of Black Studies," given when he was at Kent State University, Sowande articulated this view and argued for a black studies program nurtured on indigenous African values: "I see the Africanization of Black Studies as requiring the restructuring of Black Studies--a total restructuring if need be--so that it rests on the traditional Thought-Patterns of Traditional Africa, which thereby become its reason for being, its life essence; the actualization of these Thought-Patterns in the day to day lives of common folks being the specific objective to achieve" (Sowande 1975).

Sowande acknowledged, however, that African and black diaspora music traditions are continuously shaped by the forces of change, especially as facilitated through contact with other world cultures; composers should bear this in mind and be open to new influences in their works. According to Sowande (1965, 32), "[W]e are not prepared to submit to the doctrine of apartheid in art, by which a Nigerian musician is expected to work only within the limits of his traditional music." He therefore warned against "the dangers inherent in uncontrolled nationalism, whereby the nationals of any one country forget that, in the final analysis, they are members of one human family" (Sowande 1966, 89). But while adapting to modern influences and incorporating foreign elements, Sowande (89) stressed that modern African compositions must continue to retain important traditional features: "Practitioners of traditional African music as well as modernists must work together towards ensuring that twentieth century African music, in its various ramifications, retains its vital distinguishing values while adapting to modern challenges."

Emanating from this perspective was, as I have noted, an intercultural compositional approach defined by a synthesis of materials from African, European, and black diasporic forms, as well as a performing career that was shaped by collaboration and dialogue with black musicians. In the remaining sections of this article, I explore how Sowande's career as a performer and a composer expresses these issues.

Sowande and the Pan-African Movement in London

By the time Sowande arrived in London in 1934, the city had a considerable black population. Many were migrant laborers from Africa and the Caribbean, but there were also newly trained professionals and students, as well as visiting African Americans. Racial discrimination was common in the city. As Jeffrey Green (1990, 39) has reported, blacks visiting London were often subjected to racist humiliation. For example, Louis Armstrong and Robert Abbot, a newspaper proprietor from Chicago, were, on different occasions, prevented from staying in some hotels in London in the 1930s. (7) In view of such anti-black sentiments, prominent black leaders in London realized that in addition to concrete political action, the promotion of African culture through artistic activities was an important means of uniting black populations and challenging racist attitude toward black people.

The interaction between Roland Hayes, an African-American singer from Georgia, and Herbert Macaulay, the father of Nigerian nationalism, in 1920, for example, was motivated by the need for a united action against anti-black racism. Likewise, Paul Robeson, a lawyer and singer who frequented London regularly at the time and lived there in the 1930s, liaised constantly with other black nationalists and took part in black-organized political conferences. (8) The activities of these black nationalists in London were part of a worldwide black renaissance of the 1920s to 1950s--a period during which nationalist agitation for independence began to gather significant momentum in many African countries. (9)

Conferences and political activities were coordinated by organizations like the Pan African movement, the League of Coloured People, and the West African Students Union. Such activities usually included musical performances involving black musicians from different parts of the world. (10) Sowande's diverse musical activities in London must thus be understood as an important part of the work of black artists and political leaders of the time to promote black culture and affirm the dignity of black people. He was, for example, the music director and piano accompanist for many events organized by the West African Union and other black organizations in London in the 1930s and 1940s (Stapleton 1990, 92).

Sowande's Performing Career in London

Sowande was perhaps most widely known for his career as a jazz musician in London in the 1930s and 1940s. A pioneering Hammond organist in Britain, he was once described as the "World's finest swing organist." (11) Reviews in many newspapers of the period acknowledged his preeminence as a leading jazz performer in London. He performed at many nightclubs, the most prominent of which was the Florida Night Club in West End, where he regularly accompanied Adelaide Hall, an American singer who lived in London in the late 1930s. Sowande also performed with Rosamund Johnson, the choral conductor for Lew Leslie's Blackbirds of 1936 and the composer of the Black National Anthem ("Lift Every Voice and Sing"). In addition, he played duets with "Fats" Waller at the Florida Club in Mayfair in the late 1930s. (12) Sowande's career as a performer of black music received a significant boost when he played the solo part of George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue in a 1936 London performance ("An African Organ Genius" 1936). He was also the leader of an all-black jazz ensemble named at different times Chocolate Dandies and the Coloured Jazz Band. (13) Sowande appeared with Adelaide Hall in a 1939 Decca recording (see "Sowande and His Orchestra" 1939). That same year, his jazz trio (consisting of organ, piano, and drums) was recorded by Decca ("Introducing You" 1939). Sowande's proficiency as a jazz pianist and swing organist was widely acclaimed, and many Londoners wrongly assumed that he was an African American. He had to struggle to convince his admirers of his Nigerian citizenship. Describing the confusion over Sowande's identity, renowned composer and ethnomusicologist, Kwabena Nketia (2001, 5) recalls: "[Sowande] continued to play jazz in London, for that was the only way he could make a living and also pay for his academic courses. ... So good was he as a performer that some people mistook him for an African-American and could not believe him when he denied being American. Indeed he mentioned an instance when someone scolded him for being ashamed of revealing his African-American identity." In acknowledgment of his status as an authority on jazz, for example, he was featured as a guest artist and lecturer on jazz orchestration on BBC radio in November 1953. (14)

Sowande's performances were not limited to jazz. He was also active in the field of classical music. He joined the Royal Air force during World War II but was subsequently appointed the music director in charge of the British colonial film unit, a position that gave him the opportunity to compose original works designed for educational broadcast to Africa. Many of the works that emanated from this project are based on folk songs from Ghana and Nigeria. (15) The use of African melodies as thematic material follows a creative model provided by the works of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, a black British composer, who had earlier used Nigerian melodies in his African Romances and Twenty-Four Negro Melodies (op. 59, 1904).

The year 1944 was an eventful one for Sowande as a performer of classical music. He took over as organist at the Methodist Church at Kingsway in West London and conducted the BBC Orchestra in a performance of his tone poem, "Africana," a work based on African melodies. As a church musician, he continued to compose for the organ, writing works like "Ka Mura," "Gloria," and "Yoruba Lament," all of which are based on African melodies. By using African melodies in these works, Sowande wanted to reach out to the black members of his congregation. According to him: "Now when I was practicing, ... I used to wait until I knew there were Africans in the Church. As I played the music, I would watch them closely to see what their reaction was. If they kept walking out, I knew that I wasn't getting to them. But If I was able to communicate my ideas to them, they would sit down and listen and I would say O.K. I got them" (Southern 1976, 98). Nketia (2001, 5-6), who met Sowande while the latter was organist in London, recalls:

   My British friends who were always getting me tickets to concerts
   and other events told me about a Nigerian who plays every Sunday at
   Kingsway Hall and added that many people go there just to hear him.
   No doubt there were others who went there as a matter of sheer
   curiosity, for the sight of someone from the colonies playing the
   organ and conducting the choir at a major place of worship was a
   rarity in those days. When I went there, I could only catch a
   glimpse of him from where I sat but felt very proud of his
   achievement because I was also in music and I knew what it meant to
   get to that point.

An Overview of Sowande's Intercultural Compositional Style

Since Sowande's collaboration with black performers from different parts of the world is matched by a composing style that incorporates musical material from different cultural traditions, it is important to briefly examine the intercultural nature of his compositions.

The use of African or African-American songs, treated to European-derived harmonic procedures, is a recurring feature of Sowande's intercultural style. This approach is illustrated in his two most important orchestral works, the African Suite (1955) and the Folk Symphony (1960). I do not provide a detailed study of his orchestral works here since I have done that elsewhere. (16) My focus here is on the wider stylistic perspectives from which he derived his approach to the setting of Negro spirituals, discussed below. Sowande's Africa Suite is a five-movement composition for string orchestra. Four movements are based on African melodies. The first ("Joyful Day") and fourth movements ("Onipe") are based on two different songs by Ephraim Amu, a Ghanaian composer. The third ("Lullaby") and last movements ("Akinla") are based on Nigerian folk songs. The African Suite is typified by the use of Western-derived harmonic, tonal, and formal procedures. In the first movement, for example, African thematic elements are presented within a European-derived sonata form. The African identity of these themes is often acknowledged through the use of features like ostinati and polyrhythms (see Ex. 1).

The use of African folk songs and the incorporation of African-derived features receive their most effective illustration in Sowande's Folk Symphony, a work commissioned by the BBC to celebrate Nigeria's independence in October 1960. European forms feature prominently in this four-movement work: the first and the last movements are cast in a sonata allegro form, while the second movement employs a vivace scherzo. The third movement is in an andante rondo form. But, as in the African Suite, Sowande applies these European-derived elements with great sensitivity to the African identity of the thematic material. This is particularly striking in the last movement, where various dance melodies are strung together in a manner that evokes the principle of collective improvisation as found in highlife music. (17)

Interestingly, although the third movement's rondo form is European derived, its use here helps to accord considerable prominence to the Nigerian melody (the rondo theme) of that movement through constant repetition. Furthermore, the rondo theme alternates with episodes of material also derived from different Yoruba melodies, including a dirge (see Ex. 2). The use of a rondo in this movement also has a larger structural significance. The rondo theme is central to the large-scale process of thematic transformation in the symphony, appearing in a disguised form in the first and second movements and reappearing in the last movement. The strategic use of a rondo form in the third movement typifies Sowande's penchant for the use of stylistic elements from different cultural traditions (in this case, African and European) to reinforce one another.

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Sowande's intercultural style must be understood against the background of the British colonial administration in Nigeria. As many scholars have observed, the Christian church in Nigeria provided a fertile ground for the growth of European music in the country (see, e.g., Ayandele [1967]). European Protestant hymns, chants, and classical music were performed during church services. The dominance of European music in Nigerian churches was facilitated by a colonial policy that discouraged the use of Nigerian instruments and folk songs because of their alleged pagan origins. Following protracted agitation, however, the British missionaries and Nigerian Christians reached a compromise. It guaranteed that Nigerian folk songs could be used provided that their lyrics were changed to conform to the Christian doctrine. The use of such melodies, set to Christian texts and accompanied by the European organ, was pioneered by church musicians like Mojola Agbebi, the Reverend J. J. Ransome-Kuti, Ekundayo Phillips, and Emmanuel Sowande (Fela Sowande's father) during the colonial era. Fela Sowande sang many of these songs as a member of the choir at Christ's Church (now Christ Church Cathedral), Lagos, in the 1920s. Many of the songs that he used in his compositions were the same folk songs adapted by the pioneering church musicians. More significant is that his use of these folk songs as thematic material in extended compositions like the Folk Symphony and African Suite represents an extension on the models provided in the works of his predecessors.

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Sowande's Negro Spirituals

The significance of Negro spirituals in Sowande's works is revealed in the fact that they account for close to twenty-five percent of his compositional output. Spirituals were a particularly appropriate medium for Sowande to identify with the essence of the history and struggles of African Americans. The texts are replete with double meaning, in which acts of resistance are surreptitiously cast in religious expressions and allusions to biblical stories. For example, the experiences of the Hebrews are often represented with symbolic references to the experiences of blacks in the United States. Examples include association between the confinement of slavery and the walls of Jericho; and between the Jordan River and the Ohio River. The quest for freedom is signified in the victories of biblical characters like David, Samson, and Daniel. The spirituals are thus commentaries on the dehumanizing institution of slavery, the survival strategies adopted to cope with it, and the acts of resistance that it generated.

Sowande's arrangements of spirituals were written between 1954 and 1962. They are typified by a musical configuration that gives life to the themes of agony, protest, hope, and change. Sowande's experience as a former colonial subject must have provided a filter through which the ethnographic world of Negro spirituals resonated. "My Way's Cloudy" (1955) illustrates the themes that recur in many of the spirituals. They include prayer for divine intervention as a response to oppression, as illustrated in the following text:

   Sen a dem Angels, Sen' dem down, Helleluja
   My way's cloudy
   Dere's fire in de Eas' and fire in de Wes'
   Dere's fire among dem Methodist
   Satan is mad an I is glad
   He los' de soul he thought he had
   Lord sen a dem Angels down.

The theme of oppression is vivid in the third line, "fire in de Eas' and in de Wes'." The "way" is also mysteriously cloudy, and the singer desperately calls for divine intervention through the Lord's angels. Satan stands for the oppressor whose grip on his captives is considered tenuous because he will surely "los' de soul he thought he has."

Negro spirituals and many of the African melodies that Sowande used in his orchestral works possess some strikingly similar features. These include pentatonic scales, a generally vibrant rhythmic character, and call-and-response patterns. In amplifying the impact of these features in his arrangements of spirituals, Sowande adopted elements of construction similar to those found in his orchestral works, such as ostinato patterns, embellishing phrases, improvisatory-like polyrhythmic textures, and harmonic procedures that integrate African and European procedures. The following analyses of selected examples illustrates Sowandes's use of these features. (18)

"Sit Down Servant" (1961)

In "Sit Down Servant" (TTBB, with solo tenor), Sowande uses a process of continuous variation to develop the basic melody. Other features include a series of call-and-response patterns and an antiphonal presentation involving the tenor soloist and choir. These features are illustrated in the opening measures, during which the soloist and choir engage in successive overlapping call-and-response patterns within the piece's B minor tonality (see Ex. 3).

As in much African and African-American music, rhythm plays a significant role in the structural unfolding of Sowande's arrangement. Of particular note is his use of a progressively denser polyrhythmic texture to generate a sense of movement. Beginning in measure 19, for example, different variants of the melodic material are juxtaposed. While the main melody appears in the solo tenor part, the remaining parts supply embellished, fragmentary phrases as accompaniment. These different parts, with their unequal lengths and different rhythms, evoke a process of spontaneous and collective improvisation (see Ex. 4).

Sowande also retains African and African-American performance practices through the use of ostinato phrases in the tenor and baritone parts. In measures 26-34, for example, the baritones and basses provide repetitions of a nonsensical vocable, as shown in Example 5. Beginning in measure 35, two fresh vocables ("duh-ah" and "ah"; Ex. 6) appear, functioning heterophonically to embellish the main melody in the solo tenor part. The ternary structure of the piece is established when the call-and-response pattern of the opening section returns, with a corresponding change to a predominantly homophonic texture.

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"Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray" (1958)

The main melody of "Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray," which is pentatonic in character, is introduced in measures 1-8. Texture and rhythms also play crucial roles in the unfolding process of this piece and in defining its ternary outline. The opening measures are predominantly homophonic, while the middle section (mm. 16-31) features a greater density of texture--a polyrhythmic setting within which there are as many as seven independent parts (mm. 25-27; see Ex. 7). It is not surprising that the piece's D minor tonality becomes obliterated within the multilayered texture of the middle section. In the remaining part of the piece, the homophonic texture returns, although with sporadic appearances of embellishing phrases, as in measures 33-35.

"Wheel Oh Wheel" (1961)

African-derived procedures are more elaborate in Sowande's arrangement of "Wheel Oh Wheel" (SATB), which is cast in an extended ternary structure. Unlike those of the two previous pieces, the opening eight measures, which introduce the main melody, are polyrhythmic. The first section (mm. 1-48) features no major tonal changes and is framed by consistent call-and-response repetitions of the main tune. The middle section (mm. 49-82) breaks into a heterophonic arrangement in which an ostinato pattern is reiterated by the altos, tenors, and basses to accompany the melody of the soprano part (see Ex. 8).

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In the second part of the middle section (mm. 57-82), the texture becomes more fragmentary, while the tempo slows down. Within this segment, the main melody is accompanied by hummed parts. Toward the end of the middle section (mm. 65-82), the choral writing becomes predominantly homophonic, while the main melody is rendered antiphonally with considerable chromaticism. In the last section of the piece (mm. 83-115), the ostinato patterns of mm. 49-56 are recalled, along with repetitions of the opening theme.

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"Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child" (1955)

The theme of oppression and a sense of pathos pervade Sowande's "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child." The spiritual expresses the singer's emotional pain and a longing for freedom. The emotive temperament of the spiritual is amply articulated in the text:

   Sometime I feel like a motherless child
   Sometimes I feel like a motherless child
   Away from home
   Sometimes I feel like I'm almost gone
   Sometimes I feel like I'm almost gone
   Way up in the heav'nly land.

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Sowande's setting appropriately depicts the song's emotive quality through a host of structural procedures. These include the use of a variety of dynamic markings, rubato, parallel harmonies in thirds, imitative procedures that are not delineated through modulations, and random division and merging of parts. Examples 9 and 10 illustrate some of these features. Tempo changes, enhanced through the use of rubato, and fluctuations in meter and durational movement, which pervade the piece, evoke an extemporized delivery style that is characteristic of African and African-American performances. The soft dynamic markings of measures 27-28 suggest a musical painting of the text "I feel like am almost gone." As in many of Sowande's arrangements, tonal movement in this piece remains relatively static. Regular changes in texture constitute the principal means of generating a sense of movement. Thus, despite the change to the subdominant tonal level in measures 29-38, the (rather vague) ternary outline of the piece derives principally from the return of the overlapping antiphony of the opening bars.

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The tonal character of this piece oscillates between pentatonic and diatonic systems. The alternation between major and minor sevenths highlights this mixed tonal identity. In addition to the continuous alternation between d and d# are other instances of chromatic alterations, including c and c#, b and b[flat], and f and f#. These modal mixtures help generate some harmonic-tonal interest. More important, however, they help accentuate the emotive quality of the piece. Of particular significance in this regard are the semitonal descents of measures 15-17 (Ex. 10).

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Sowande's treatment of spirituals ultimately draws attention to the politics of identity in the United States. The debate about how to define and negotiate black identity in this country became a central theme of the discourse within the Harlem Renaissance movement of the early twentieth century. Many writers, artists, and composers of the period engaged in a lively debate about how to configure and define black identity in music through art, poetry, and prose. On one side of the debate were composers like Nathaniel Dett and William Grant Still, both of whom conceived and treated vernacular forms, such as the Negro spirituals, as materials amenable to further artistic development. (19) In this approach, spirituals are treated to European-derived harmonic and formal techniques and transformed into extended compositions. In contrast to this approach, artists and intellectuals like Zora Neale Hurston (folklorist and novelist) and Langston Hughes (poet) extolled the beauty and subliminal charm of vernacular forms as they are. They frowned upon any transformation that would undermine the qualities of these vernacular forms. Sowande's arrangements strike a balance between these two approaches. In addition to retaining important stylistic elements associated with African-American and African performances, he used European-derived harmonic and formal procedures in a manner that did not undermine the identity of the spirituals.

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Sowande's U.S. Tour

Sowande's first visit to the United States was in 1957. The trip, sponsored by the U.S. Department of State under a special program known as the "Lender and Specialist Grant," lasted several weeks and marked a new phase in his career as a musician. Sowande gave series of organ recitals and lectures at churches and university campuses. His organ recitals featured his own compositions, including "Oyigiyigi," "Obanjigi," and "Kyrie." Various reviews of his performances attest to the success of these performances, notably in their educational value and promotion of a sense of common identity among Africans and African Americans. This is evident in a review of his organ recital at the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine in New York. In that review, Wilton S. Dillion observed: "Mr Fela Sowande has given us a great deal of pleasure and information during his New York visit. His visit serves well the cause of improving African and African American relations (as well as) providing Americans both Negro and others with the benefits of African culture to our own society. An example is Sowande's recital of Yoruba music themes at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine" (quoted in Bateye 1999, 36). (20)

Personal letters written to Sowande also attest to the success of his recitals and lectures. In one such letter, dated November 15, 1957, George F. Parron, dean of the School of Fine Arts at Miami University, thanked Sowande for his lecture-recital and observed that "It was a real pleasure to have you here on the campus. The students and Faculty were very grateful for your excellent contribution to our classes concerning Nigerian music" (Sowande Private Collection, Kent, Ohio).

Sowande also visited Boston University, where he gave an organ recital. Jules Wolffers, chairman of the Division of Music, later wrote a review of the performance. Wolffers (1957) commented about the interaction of different musical traditions in Sowande's organ works:

   There was so much to ponder on and to profit from the recital of
   organ music presented by Fela Sowande of Lagos, Nigeria, last night
   at the Church of the Advent in Boston.... As a composer he has well
   realized his aim of uniting two musical cultures. All of the music
   heard was based on Negro melodies. Mr. Sowande first played the
   melody and then followed with the composition based on it. Some of
   the works veered far over to Western practice; in others the
   Nigerian element was more pronounced.

Wolffers also provided insight into Sowande's skillful balancing of Western and African elements in one of the works performed by Sowande that night, concluding that Sowande succeeded in showcasing the rich resources of African music. According to Wolffers, "One was particularly struck by the poignant beauty of 'Ohun Se O,' ... in which the composer kept the full favor of the melody's native origin while making it completely accessible to Western ears." Wolffers did not miss the diasporic resonance of Sowande's recital as highlighted in some of the pieces, remarking that "'Obangiji,' a hymn of praise may well have been an original African melody come home again after a sojourn in a far-off land. The opening measures were note for note the first phrase of the Negro spiritual, 'Sometimes I feel like a mother less child.' But whether it was the extended and highly elaborated 'Kyrie,' the simple 'Bury me Eas' or Wes',' or the ingenious old chant 'Oyigiyigi,' the organist-composer made his point decisively and successfully."

Sowande's lecture-recital tour helped to introduce African-American musicians and audiences to modern African music and composers. Mark Fax, an organist from Howard University, Washington, acknowledged the educational benefit of Sowande's concert in this regard and showered praises on him. In his letter of January 8, 1958, he acknowledged the impact of Sowande's organ playing and the quality of a choral work by Sowande's organ teacher, Ekundayo Phillips: (21)

   Please let me thank you for the time you spent last evening in
   bringing to me some knowledge of the music of Nigeria. I was most
   particularly impressed with the Mass of Phillips and performance of
   your own works. I thank you for the privilege of making a copy of
   your beautiful Prelude available. This, in my opinion, is an
   exquisite work, and I intend to use it at every opportunity I shall
   have at public performance. I shall include it in my recital at
   Baltimore on January 30th. (Quoted in Bateye 1999, 37)

Sowande also led a performance of selections from his orchestral works during this visit. On November 3, 1957, he conducted an orchestral performance of his work in Ohio. A brief review of that concert reported: "A capacity audience of more than 500 persons responded warmly here today to Fela Sowande, a native of South Nigeria, Africa. He had led the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra in the fifth and final movement, 'Akinla,' of his five-movement African Suite for String Orchestra" ("Nigerian Conducts in Ohio" 1957).

Sowande returned to Nigeria in 1958 and later embarked on the composition of his Folk Symphony. Although this work was specially commissioned to mark Nigeria's independence on October 1, 1960, Nigeria had no symphony orchestra to perform the work. The October 1960 premiere thus was performed from Britain and broadcast live by the BBC.

Sowande returned to the United States in 1962 on a Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship. During the trip, he arranged to have this work as well as the African Suite performed by members of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. That performance took place on June 1, 1962, and was conducted by Sowande himself (Rich 1962). The concert was widely publicized a number of times in the New York Times ("Music of a Nigerian" 1962; "Music Notes" 1962; "Nigerian Talks" 1962). In an article for the New York Amsterdam News titled "Sowande's Symphony moving to audience," Perdita Duncan described the reaction of the audience: 'Mr. Sowande stepped down from the podium, blew a kiss to the orchestra and then the audience began a prolonged and noisy demonstration, which only New Yorkers can give when they have heard music that has moved them" (quoted in Bateye 1999, 34). Alan Rich (1962) of the New York Times, commented on the concert thus:

   The music of new Africa arrived in abundance at Carnegie Hall last
   night as Fela Sowande, the first serious African composer to have
   his music heard in New York, conducted his own works, assisted by
   an impressive group of musicians.... He has been in the United
   States for some time observing our culture and participating in
   both anthropological and cultural events. His credentials are
   complete in both jazz and serious music, and gave a considerable
   sampling of the serious side of his abilities at this concert....
   Mr Sowande stood before the orchestra, gaunt and clad in a brown
   figured tribal tunic and conducted his music with fine skill.

It is important to understand the nature of Sowande's work as a performer against the backdrop of Nigeria's colonial and postcolonial history. Many of his organ works and orchestral pieces emanated from com missions by the colonial radio, the BBC. As mentioned previously, he conducted the BBC Orchestra in a performance of his Africana in 1944, while his largest orchestral work, the Folk Symphony, was commissioned to celebrate Nigeria's independence from Britain in 1960. Sowande's creative activity declined significantly at the end of British rule, when the apparatuses of the colonial regime in Nigeria began to decline. That his Folk Symphony could not be performed in Nigeria was a reflection of how heavily Sowande's musical career in Nigeria had depended on the patronage of the colonial regime and how vulnerable that career was without its support. His trips to the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s provided him with new opportunities to have his works performed. Compared with the United Kingdom, where Sowande worked and wrote many of his works, the United States provided a more conducive environment for the performance and reception of black musical idioms.

The overwhelming success that attended Sowande's U.S. tours was reflective of an audience that shared or was at home with black musical idioms and could thus appreciate Sowande's works. The marriage of African and African-American elements, which typified many of the works that he performed during his tours, also resonated vibrantly with the theme of cultural revival that was critical to the civil rights movement of the time.

The Final Phase of Sowande's Career

Sowande returned to Nigeria in 1962 to take up a research position at the University of Ibadan. The success of his U.S. tour, however, highlighted the frustrations he continued to face in Nigeria, where his works were rarely performed and where his ability to engage in sustained creative work was greatly hampered by political instability. Sowande's creative activity declined significantly after his return from the United States in 1962. His creative work never recovered from that decline. When Sowande finally immigrated to the United States in 1968, he engaged mainly in teaching and research, and there is no record of any significant performing or composing.

Between 1968 and 1982, Sowande taught in at least three institutions, Howard University, the University of Pittsburgh, and Kent State University. At Howard and Kent State, Sowande met Halim El Dabh, another composer from Africa who was also interested in fusing African and Western elements in his works and who had been exploring the cultural relationship between Egyptian and Yoruba cultures. El Dabh (2005, xii) recalled, "Although I had always had a strong interest in the cultures of Africa, it was not until the 1960s that I learned of the full extent of cultural connections between Egypt and the peoples of the rest of Africa (especially the Yoruba, whose gods and goddesses are closely related to the ancient gods and goddesses of Egypt)" (El-Dabh 2005, xii). Like Sowande, El Dabh conducted research into musical traditions from different parts of Africa and came to a conclusion that coincides with Sowande's global vision of black musical styles. As El Dabh explains:

   In February of 1960 I traveled to the Upper Nile province of Nuba
   in southern Egypt where, in the cities of Kalabsha and Kenous, I
   became immersed in the Nubian culture, participating in many
   popular festivals of the region. I noted that the musical scales
   used by the Nubians were primarily pentatonic (though sometimes
   mixed with heptatonic Arabic maqams, some of which featured quarter
   tones). Songs of welcome, in call and response form, featured
   syncopated clapping, stomping, and jumping similar to what one
   might find in West Africa; singers used a variety of Nubian
   languages, themselves a mixture of Sudanic and Arabic elements; and
   the dancers wore white and colorful dresses reminiscent of those of
   West Africa. All of this evoked a deep feeling of Egypt's close
   cultural relationship to West Africa. (xii)

A 1969 workshop at Howard University brought El Dabh, Akin Euba-another prominent composer from Nigeria--and Sowande together, providing an opportunity to share experiences as composers who had worked to project an African identity in their works. El Dabh explains: "The culmination of all these experiences finally came to a climax when our paths finally intersected in the spring of 1969, at a momentous three-way African music workshop featuring Akin Euba, Fela Sowande, and myself, at Howard University in Washington, D.C." (xii).

As I have observed, however, there is no record of any creative activity by Sowande from 1968, when he moved to the United States, until his death in 1987. He concentrated on teaching and rarely engaged in any performance--a fact confirmed by Guy and Laura Pernetti (2007), two of his former students and close friends. Sowande's interaction with El Dabh must have been limited to the sharing of knowledge about the cultural and philosophical ideas and practices that bind constituencies of African and black populations around the world. Indeed, the formulation of an educational program that derived from such ideas was Sowande's main preoccupation from 1968 to the end of his life. Although Sowande almost completely abandoned musical performance and composition during this last phase of his life, his work as a teacher must still be seen as an important extension of his previous work. At this point in his life, Sowande seemed more concerned with assessing the pedagogical value of his previous work as a composer and performer and developing the values that had guided his creative and performance work into a coherent educational curriculum designed for black students.

Summary and Conclusion

The onset of a pan-African movement in London, designed to combat racism and colonialism in places as far-flung as the United States, the Caribbean, and Africa, provided the immediate context for many of Sowande's musical activities in the early part of the last century. His role as a performer in the United States later in the twentieth century continued the intradiasporic musical encounter that was initiated in London, and it highlighted Sowande's role in promoting black music in the United States. The encounter between African and African-American cultures that is found in his work mirrors a wider intercultural approach to musical composition, defined by a synthesis of European and African or African-American music. His arrangements of Negro spirituals, which provided a creative forum for demonstrating the kinship between African and African-American cultures, and his work as a jazz musician represented the most significant aspects of his engagement with black diasporic idioms. The strong presence of features like ostinato, polyrhythms, the pentatonic scale, call-and-response patterns, and the simulation of improvisation in his arrangements of spirituals represents a vital index of his notion of a black musical aesthetics. As I have explained, these features are also found in substantial proportions in his other compositions, especially those written for the orchestra. The recurrent nature of these features in Sowande's works, including those that are specifically designed to evoke the character of indigenous Nigerian music, underlines his assessment of these features as being of strategic importance to African and African-American creative expressions. But as I have shown in my discussion, his use of these elements in his arrangements of Negro spirituals clearly acknowledges the dynamic nature of black music and its continuing engagement with European musical tradition.

Finally, it must be noted that Sowande's intercultural composing style pioneered a new idiom of art music in Nigeria. His desire to reflect an African or black identity in works that bear a strong impact of European music inspired a new generation of composers, including Akin Euba, Joshua Uzoigwe, Sam Akpabot, and Laz Ekwueme. For many of these composers, however, the use of African thematic material in such works needs to be supported with other devices in order to achieve a stronger African identity in their works. The use of traditional African instruments is one such device. In Akin Euba's Igi Nla So (1964), for example, Yoruba traditional instruments are combined with the piano, while Uzoigwe's Ritual Procession (1983) features only traditional African instruments. These newer works constitute extensions on Sowande's pioneering work.

This article derives significantly from fieldwork conducted in Nigeria and the United States. For my fieldwork in Nigeria (1987-2004), I wish to acknowledge the assistance of the following people: Akin Euba, Sam Akpabot, Joshua Uzoigwe, Moloye Bateye, Olaolu Omideyi, I. F. Aiyelaagbe, Samuel Adedeji, Wole Adetiran, Christopher Ayodele, and Femi Abiodun. For my fieldwork in the United states during January 2007, I wish to acknowledge the assistance of Guy and Laura Pernetti for granting me access to the Sowande Private Collection, of which they are the managers, and for providing important pieces of information on the last few years of Sowande's life. Many of Sowande's published works are now out of print. I am grateful to the following for their assistance in obtaining some scores and certain important recordings: BBC Music Library (The Folk Symphony); Chappell Publishing Company (African Suite); Moloye Bateye (organ works, vocal works including Negro spiritual arrangements); Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan (Three Yoruba Songs); University of Ire, Music Department: Sound Archive (recordings of The Folk Symphony and the African Suite), and Guy Pernetti (Sowande's scrapbook, personal letters, and recordings).

APPENDIX

Sowande's Negro Spirituals (22)

"All I Do" (SATBB with piano and rhythm combo). 1961. New York: G. Ricordi.

"Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray" (SATB with soprano solo). 1958. New York: G. Ricordi.

"De Angels Are Watchin'" (SATB with soprano and tenor soli). 1958. New York: G. Ricordi.

"De Ol' Arks a-Moverin'" (SATBB, with tenor solo). 1955. London: Chappell.

"Goin' to Set Down" (SATB with soprano solo). 1961. New York: Franco Columbo.

"Heav'n Bells Are Ringin'" (SATB).

"My Way's Cloudy" (SATB and piano). 1955. London: Chappell.

"Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen" (SSAATTBB). By Harry Burleigh, arranged by Fela Sowande. New York: Franco Colombo.

"Out of Zion" (SATB and organ). 1953. (Commissioned by the Lagos Musical Society for the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II.)

"Roll de Ol' Chariot" (SATBB with piano and rhythm combo). 1961. New York: G. Ricordi.

"Same Train" (SATBB, a capella). 1955. London: Chappell.

"Sit Down Servant" (TTBB and tenor solo). 1961. New York: G. Ricordi.

"Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child" (SATB). 1955. London: Chappell.

"Stan' Still, Jordan" (SATBB). By Harry Burleigh, arranged by Fela Sowande. New York: Franco Colombo.

"Steal Away" (SATBB). London: Chappell.

"Wheel Oh Wheel" (SATB). 1961. New York: G. Ricordi.

"Wid a Sword in Ma Han'" (SATBB, a capella) 1958. New York: G. Ricordi.

REFERENCES

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An African organ genius. 1936. The [London] Era January 8.

Anonymous. 1936. Birmingham Mail March 9.

Anonymous. 1939. Southport Guardian June 6.

Ayandele, Emmanuel Ayankanmi. 1967. The missionary impact on modern Nigeria, 1842-1914: A political and social analysis. New York: Humanities Press.

Baraka, Amiri [Leroy Jones]. 1963. Blues people: Negro music in the white America. New York: William Morrow.

Bateye, Olumoloye. 2001. An analysis of the 1st movement of the Nigerian Folk Symphony of Fela Sowande. In African Art Music in Nigeria, edited by M. Omibiyi-Obidike, 1-15. Ibadan: Stirling-Horden.

Burleigh. H. T. 1916. Deep river: Old Negro melody. New York: G. Ricordi.

Courlander, Harold. 1963. Negro folk music. New York: Columbia University Press. de Lerma, Domique-Rene. 1970. Black music in our culture: Curricular ideas on the subjects, materials, and problems. Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press.

--. 2005. Sowanda, Fela, 1905-1987. http://www.africanchorus.org/Artists/ Sowande.htm.

Duberman, Martin. 2005. Paul Robeson: A biography. New York: New Press.

El-Dabh, Halim. 2005. Foreword. In Multiple interpretations of dynamics of creativity and knowledge in African music traditions, edited by Bode Omojola and George Dor, ix-xi. Point Richard, Calif.: MRI Press.

Floyd, Samuel A., Jr. 1993. Black music in the Harlem renaissance. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press,

--. 1999. Ring shout! Literary studies, historical studies, and black music inquiry. In Signifyn(g), sanctifyin(g), and slam dunking: A reader in African American expressive culture, edited by Caponi Gena Dagel, 135-156. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press.

Green, Jeffrey. 1990. Afro-American symphony: Popular black concert hall performers 1900-40. In Black music in Britain, edited by Paul Oliver, 34-44. Milton Keynes, U.K.: Open University Press.

Herskovits, Melville J. 1941. The myth of the Negro past. New York: Harper and Brothers. Hildreth, John Wesley. 1978. Keyboard works of selected black musicians. Ph.D. diss., Northwestern University

Introducing you to Mr. Aluwa Fe-Ola Oso- Wa-Mi-De. 1939. Everybody's Weekly [London] June 17.

Jackson, A. Travis. 2003. Jazz performance as ritual: The blues aesthetics and the African diaspora. In The African diaspora: A musical perspective, 23-82, edited by Ingrid Monson. New York: Routledge.

Johnson, James Weldon, and J. Rosamund Johnson. 1925. The books of America Negro spirituals. New York: Viking Press. Keil, Charles. 1991. Urban blues. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Kimberlin, Cynthia Tse, and Akin Euba, eds. 1992. Intercultural music. Vol. 1. Bayreuth: Bayreuth African Studies and Intercultural Music Arts.

Laidman, Janet Loretta. 1989. The use of black spirituals in the organ music of contemporary black composers as illustrated in the works of three composers. Ed.D. diss., Columbia University Teachers College.

Munday, Myron. C. 1992. A selected bibliography of solo organ works by black composers. D.Mus. thesis, Florida State University, Tallahassee.

Music of a Nigerian to be heard. 1962. New York Times March 13.

Music notes. 1962. New York Times April 5.

Nigerian conducts in Ohio. 1957. New York Times November 4.

Nigerian talks of music in the US. 1962. Christian Science Monitor, June 4: 2.

Nigerian talks of music in the U.S. 1962. New York Times May 29.

Nketia, Kwabena. 2001. Fela Sowande's world of music. In African Art Music in Nigeria, edited by M. Omibiyi-Obidike, 1-15. Ibadan: Stirling-Horden.

--. 2005. Ethnomusicology and African music: Modes of inquiry and interpretation. Collected Papers, Vol. 1. Accra: AFRAM Publications.

Oliver, Paul, ed. 1990. Black music in Britain. Milton Keynes, U.K.: Open University Press.

Omibiyi-Obidike, Mosunmola, ed. 2001. African art music in Nigeria. Ibadan: Stirling Horden.

Omojola, Bode. 1995. Nigerian art music, with an introductory study of Ghanaian art music. lbadan: Institut Francais de Recherche en Afrique.

--. 2001. Nigerian melodies and European forms: A study of Sowande's organ works. In African art music in Nigeria, edited by Mosunmola Omibiyi-Obidike, 1-15. Ibadan: Stirling-Horden.

Omojola, Bode, and George Dor, eds. 2005. Multiple interpretations of dynamics of creativity and knowledge in African music traditions: A festschrift to Akin Euba. Point Richard, Calif.: MRI Press.

Pernetti, Guy, and Laura Pernetti. 2007. Interview with the author, January 5-8.

Rich, Alan. 1962. Fela Sowande, African voice. New York Times June 2: 9.

Southern, Eileen. 1976. Conversation with Fela Sowande, High Priest of Music. Black Perspective in Music 4, no. 1: 90-104.

Sowande and his orchestra at old Florida. 1939. Melody Maker June 24.

Sowande, Fela. Scrapbook. Guy Pernetti, private collection, Kent, Ohio.

--. 1965. The Catholic Church and the tone languages of Nigeria. Unpublished manuscript,

Guy Pernetti, private collection, Kent, Ohio.

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Stuckey, Sterling. 1976. I want to be , African: Paul Robeson and the ends of nationalist theories and practice. Los Angeles: University of California Press.

Tallmadge, William. 1984. Blue note and blue tonality. Black Perspective in Music 12: 155-165.

Waterman, Richard. 1952. African influence on the music of the Americans. In Acculturation in the Americas. Proceedings of the Twenty-ninth International Congress of Americanists, Vol. 11,207-218, edited by Sol Tax. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

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DISCOGRAPHY

Sowande, Fela. Jazz trio. Decca F.7061 (1939).

-- [with Adelaide Hall]. Decca 1.7038 (1939).

--. The Negro in sacred idiom. London LL-533 (1952).

--. African suite for string orchestra and harp. The New Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Trevor Harvey. Decca LM 4547 (1952).

(1.) For more biographical information on Fela Sowande, see Omojola (1995).

(2.) These activities were co-coordinated by the International Consortium for the Music of Africa and Its Diaspora (ICMAD) with the participation of the Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan, Nigeria; the Musical Society of Nigeria (MUSON); and the International Center for African Music and Dance, Ghana.

(3.) Several London newspapers and art magazines published reviews or announcements of Sowande's performances within and outside London in the late 1930s. Examples included the Birmingham Mail (Anonymous 1936) and the Melody Maker ("Sowande and His Orchestra" 1939).

(4.) The phrase black diaspora musical styles or elements as used in this article refers to the musical traditions and styles or stylistic elements that are associated with African Americans and which derive from or are linked to ancestral connections with the continent of Africa.

(5.) This article derives from my forthcoming book Sounds without Borders: African Identity, Black Diaspora Themes, and Western Forms in the Music of Fela Sowande, published by MRI Press.

(6.) I am very grateful to Mount Holyoke College for sponsoring my trip to Kent, Ohio, to collect certain vital primary sources and to conduct an interview with Guy and Laura Pernetti (2005).

(7.) Robert Abbot was the publisher of The Chicago Defender, arguably one of the two most widely read, and therefore highly influential, black newspapers in the United States.

(8.) For further discussion on the life of Paul Robeson, see Duberman (2005).

(9.) For further discussions on the activities of these black leaders, both within and outside London, see Sterling Stuckey (1976) and Floyd (1993).

(10.) For further discussion on the performance activities of black artists in London in the early part of the twentieth century, see Oliver (1990).

(11.) This description of Sowande's skill as a jazz organist appeared in an undated printed program issued by The Ambassadors Restaurant in Chester, England. Another description of Sowande's skills as a jazz organist is found in a letter written by the manager of the Capitol Theatre in Cardiff following Sowande's resignation from the theater as resident jazz organist. In a letter dated June 20, 1941, the manager wrote that Sowande was a "Nulli Secundus," whose "fame as an organist has spread to all places on the globe where wireless can be heard." Furthermore, the Southport Guardian described Sowande as an "African organ genius" ("An African Genius" 1939).

(12.) Many newspapers of the period provided details or reviews of Sowande's role as a jazz performer. See, for example, Anonymous (1936).

(13.) As one might expect, membership of Sowande's band changed from time to time. At one time, members of Sowande's Coloured Jazz Band at the Old Florida Night Club in London (as provided in Sowande's scrapbook) were Rudy Evans (tenor saxophone), Mumford Taylor (alto saxophone), Frank Deniz (guitar), Leslie Hutchinson (trumpet), Edmund Ross (drums), Bruce Vanderpuye (double bass), Fred Grant (clarinet), and Fela Sowande (piano).

(14.) This information is provided in Sowande's vitae, a copy of which I obtained from Guy Pernetti, the manager of Sowande's estate.

(15.) Works emanating from this project included orchestral and organ works. The organ works, including pieces like "Oyigiyigi (Jubilate)" and "Yoruba Lament," were later recorded by Decca under the title The Negro in Sacred Idiom. In 1943, Sowande wrote a signature tune, titled "Ogangiji," for the BBC West African broadcast. This tune was based on a song of the same title, written earlier by a Yoruba priest-musician, the Reverend J. J. Ransome-Kuti.

(16.) For a detailed study of Sowande's Folk Symphony, see Omojola (1995).

(17.) Highlife refers to a type of popular music prevalent in West African countries, especially Ghana and Nigeria.

(18.) A list of Sowande's spiritual arrangements is provided in the Appendix. Copies of these and other compositions by Sowande are deposited in the Department of Black Studies, Kent State University; and the Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan, Nigeria, among many other places.

(19.) This approach had been suggested earlier in Burleigh (1916).

(20.) I am grateful to Moloye Bateye for drawing my attention to the existence of these reviews. I was consequently able to consult these newspapers through their respective online archives.

(21.) Ekundayo Philips was one of the first Nigerian-trained organists. He studied music at the Royal College of Music, London, from 1911 to 1914.

(22.) This list is based on a copy of Sowande's vitae as well as Dominique-Rene de Lerma's (2004) compilation. I am grateful to de Lerma and to Guy Pernetti, who made available a copy of Sowande's vitae.

BODE OMOJOLA is a Five College assistant professor of ethnomusicology. Omojola's work covers indigenous and modern Yoruba and Nigerian musical traditions and has addressed themes like performance practices, music and politics, and intercultural aesthetics.