Juju

For many years the most popular style in Nigeria, juju music evolved from Yoruba folklore and a variety of international elements. Early in the century, Lagos was a place where local peoples encountered freed slaves from the New World. Together they created a recreational music that came to be known as palm-wine music, as it usually accompanied drinking. Banjos, guitars, shakers and hand drums supported lilting topical songs and produced local celebrities, notably "Baba" Tunde King, apparently the first to call his music juju.

British-recorded 78s of early work by Tunde King, Ogoge Daniel, Speedy Araba and especially Tunde Nightingale established the core repertoire that would shape this fast-evolving style. Electricity and the ability to amplify voices and strings created the possibility of bringing in heavier percussion, in particular the Yoruba taking drum, or gangan. Starting in the late '50s, I.K. Dairo became the first juju singer to exploit these possibilities adding electric guitars and an accordion, which he played himself, to the mix. Then Chief Commander Ebenezer Obey came along in the '60s, followed by King Sunny Ade and his African Beats in the '70s.

The competition between Obey and KSA, as Nigerians know Ade, engaged the public and fueled rapid evolution of the juju sound as trap drums, pedal-steel guitar, synthesizers and more and more percussion instruments joined the lineup. By the time KSA first toured internationally in the early '80s, juju could compete with that era's best rock music for its force of expression, theatricality and visceral impact. With some 20 musicians on stage, Ade quickly won a loyal audience and effectively launched the international Afropop phenomenon. Other African artists like Miriam Makeba and Manu Dibango had made a splash, but after KSA began touring a larger awareness of African music began to dawn. As such, juju holds a unique position in the history of all African pop.

Meanwhile back in Nigeria, after the long, virtually unchallenged reign of KSA and Ebenezer Obey, master showman "Sir" Shina Peters opened the door to a new generation of juju musicians. He and singer Segun Adewale started out backing juju veteran Prince Adekunle, but in 1977 he and Peters formed Shina Adewale and the Superstars International. In 1980 the two young rebels went different ways: Segun promoted a fusion style he called yo-pop and Shina emerging in the late '80s with his Afro-juju style, a more percussion-heavy take on the juju sound. Shina's music nods to Fela Kuti's funky Afrobeat and to the percussion frenzy of fuji music, but it remains essentially juju. With songs stressing moral themes, Shina won awards in Nigeria in 1989 and '90. Around the same time, Dele Taiwo made hay with a punchy, keyboard-rich sound he called funky juju.

In the 1990s percussive fuji music and local reggae became very popular with Nigerian listeners, ending juju's long-held dominance. These days, as elsewhere in Africa, hip-hop aesthetics are popular with young musicians and fans, and new variations on juju are emerging as the style changes its shape to suit the times. – Banning Eyre, Courtesy Afropop Worldwide: www.afropop.org