| 7 years after Fela’s
death: The Kutis: Music flows in their blood
By Maurice Archibong
Monday, August 2, 2004
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• Yeni
Photo: Sun News Publishing |
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The maxim, like father like son; is bound to cross the mind,
when you think about the late Afrobeat king Fela Anikulapo-Kuti
and one of his offspring, Femi. The same goes for another
of the deceased star’s son, Seun. Although none has
yet attained the global popularity their dad was associated
with, it can’t be said that Femi hasn’t made tremendous
strides in that direction. Barely ten years after waxing his
first album, Femi has won the prestigious Kora Award and toured
Africa, Europe and the Americas extensively.
It is still difficult to rate Seun, given that he is yet to
put out a record despite much publicity of his pre-release
efforts at Eko FM Studios in 2001. Whatever the case, it can’t
be said that Fela didn’t pass down some musical genes
to his descendants. Naturally, one would say that music apparently
runs in the veins of the Anikulapo-Kutis, but the story goes
much farther than two generations!
Just as Femi and Seun are treading in their father’s
footsteps as musicians, Fela also took after his own father,
the Revered Israel Oludotun Ransome-Kuti. In fact, the reverend
gentleman also inherited that talent from Fela’s grandpa,
the Reverend Josiah Jesse Ransome-Kuti. Like his father, who
had in school (Fourah Bay College) built up on his knowledge
of music acquired at home, Fela also took further courses
in music at the tertiary education level after acquainting
himself with the rudiments through taking advantage of the
keyboard instrument at home.
However, Fela was a full-time artiste, whereas neither his
father nor grandfather (both of who could play and read music)
worked as a professional musician. It might interest the reader
to know that Fela’s great-grandfather was also a famous
drummer in Abeokuta! In other words, the Anikulapo-Kutis are
the fifth generation of musicians in this much-revered Nigerian
family.
Fela’s parents
A lot of people are familiar with Fela’s mother, Mrs.
Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, because of the late lady’s political
and social activism. She is also widely held as the first
Nigerian woman to drive a car, and the brutality she suffered
at the hands of the so-called Unknown Soldier that laid to
waste Fela’s Kalakuta Republik, certainly threw the
lady into media limelight for years, after her retirement!
However, those who should know are of the view that the late
musician’s father and grandfather did quite a lot for
the Nigerian nation with regard to helping to mould the characters
of countless youth that passed through the various schools
and Churches, where they taught or worked.
All the same, we’ll start on the ladies’ first
note. Born in Abeokuta in 1900, Funmilayo was the daughter
of Pastor Thomas, an Aku or Saro (Sierra Leonean returnee),
whose roots lay in Ilesa. Little Funmilayo grew up in the
Remi-Remi part of Abeokuta and had good education at christian
Mission Schools. The lady later married the Reverend Israel
Oludotun. The couple had four children that survived infancy:
Dolupo, Koye, Fela and Beko. In 1947 she was a member of the
National Council for Nigeria and the Cameroons (NCNC) delegation
that went on a political mission to London but it is doubtful
that Mrs. Ransome-Kuti’s activism always dovetailed
with her Christian evangelist husband’s ideals.
With regard to Fela’s father, The Reverend Israel Oludotun
Ransome-Kuti; a review by Hakeem Bello, titled Fela and the
early Kutis, which was published in the Sunday Times (August
10, 1997), recalls: “He (Reverend I. O.) was Junior
Master, Abeokuta Grammar School (1900-1912); Assistant Master,
CMS Grammar School, Lagos (1916-1918); Principal, Ijebu-Ode
Grammar School (1919-1931) and Principal, Abeokuta Grammar
School (1932-1954)”.
Born in 1891, The Reverend Israel Oludotun was premier president
of the Nigeria Union of Teachers (1931-1954). The Reverend
I. O. earned a B.A. from the University of Durham, UK. He
also took an M.A. in Liberal Theology and served on the Elliot
Commission on Higher Education in West Africa.
Bello again: “The majority report of the commission,
to which he subscribed, led to the foundation of the University
of Ibadan and similar institutions in West Africa”.
The Reverend Israel Oludotun consolidated on his music studies
at Fourah Bay College, Sierra Leone. But he had his early
training in music from his father, the Reverend J. J., who
was a notable organist.
Although Fela’s father composed several songs, the most
popular must be “Iwe-kiko”, where the cleric implores
scholars to marry education with farming. As the song goes:
Ise agbe n’ise ile wa, eni ko s’ise ama jale;
Iwe kiko, l’aisi oko ati ada, koipe o, koipe o (Farming
is our traditional occupation, an idle mind is the devil’s
workshop. Education without the hoe and cutlass is incomplete…
incomplete); the cleric warned.
Fela’s grandfather, the Reverend Josiah Jesse Ransome-Kuti
(also fondly called Reverend J.J.), was born in the mid 19th
century. He hailed from Orile Igbein, now on the outskirts
of Abeokuta. The father of Reverend Josiah Jesse used to be
a professional drummer and died in the early 1860s. Following
the death of his father, when he was barely 10 years old,
little J. J. was strongly influenced by his mother, Ekidan,
who had converted to the Christian faith in 1848. Her late
husband used to be a traditional worshipper.
In 1871, J.J enrolled at the Church Missionary Training Institute,
Lagos. He graduated, six years later and joined the teaching
staff of a school in Ake, Abeokuta.
According to Issac O. Delano, author of Josiah Ransome-Kuti,
Fela’s grandfather had a fine voice and had learned
to play the piano and compose hymns. In 1882, Reverend J.
J. married Bertha Amy Olubi.
Delano again: “She (Bertha Amy) came from one of the
best homes in the country. She was the eldest and favourite
daughter of the late Reverend D. Olubi of Kudeti, Ibadan,
a native of Abeokuta, (and) a descendant of the Onitesi of
Itesi”. In 1887, Reverend and Mrs. J. J. Ransome-Kuti
relocated to Gbagura, Abeokuta, where they started “a
new Christian community”, going by Delano’s writing.
Within 16 years, Rev. J. J. is said to have founded 25 new
Christian communities and baptized some 2,600 children and
adults. In that same period, he had built 30 churches as well
as secure 70 workers for the Mission, among other groundbreaking
strides. In 1895, he was deservedly ordained a deacon, and
six years later deployed to head St. Peter’s Ake, where
Wole Soyinka would later grow up.
Before the Reverend gentleman’s death in 1930, J. J.
had served as Canon of the Cathedral Church of Christ, Lagos
as well as worked in England. The Reverend J. J. had a strong
hand in the upbringing of, not only his own children (such
as Oludotun) but also in the rearing of some of his grandchildren.
One of them, Eniola, later married Ayodele Soyinka and gave
birth to one of the world’s brightest brains, Prof.
Wole Soyinka.
Keeping it in the family
Aside the Ransome-Kutis, other Abeokuta families that have
produced musicians from generation to generation include the
Olatunjis and the Omowuras. The latter produced the late Apala
maestro Alhaji Ayinla Omowura (alias Egun Magaji), whose son
Akeem has released eight albums to date. Kabiru, another of
the late Egun Magaji’s sons, is also into music. Kabiru
is, however, a Fuji artiste. Although none of the late Yussuf
Olatunji’s children toed their dad’s career line,
one of the late Baba l’Egba’s grandchild, Abideen
Ajasa Olatunji is being primed to fit into the large shoes
Baba l’Egba left behind.
However, the Egba of Abeokuta are not the only ones that spawn
musicians down more than one filial generation. Nigerians
are familiar with Paul “play” Dairo, who took
after his late dad, I. K. (Isaac Kehinde) Dairo. The late
I. K. Dairo was the first Nigerian musician (and probably
the only one to date) to be honoured with a Member of the
British Empire (MBE). The Dairos hail from Ijebu-Ijesha.
Another Yoruba family that has produced musicians across generations
is the Haruna Isholas. Alhaji Babatunde Haruna Ishola, one
of the sons of another late Apala star, Alhaji Haruna Ishola,
is in fact already or almost nationally famous with his recent
album, which could rightly be described as a chartbuster of
sorts.
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