Nigeria’s rich history of classical music gets a convincing revival in “Ekele: Piano
Music African Composers”, the debut album by Rebeca Omordia, the London-
based pianist of Nigerian and Romanian descent. She is an alumnus of Trinity
College of Music and Royal Birmingham Conservatory (both in the UK) where she
has taught for the past ten years. Omordia has collaborated with a range of
celebrated international musicians that include Julian Lloyd Webber, double
bassist Leon Bosch, pianist Mark Bebbington, cellist Raphael Wallfisch and
Chineke orchestra, the first professional orchestra consisting of majority black
and ethnic minorities in Europe.
“Ekele” is a result of a five year research into the works of pioneering Nigerian
composers: Ayo Bankole, Fred Onovwerosuoke and Christian Onyeji most of which
were composed pre-independence in 1960 and in the years after, at a time when
the country was shaking off the shackles of British colonialism while defining its
own cultural identity.
“Rebeca is a fluent pianist. She’s classical trained in Eastern Europe and has a
certain technical facility and a flexibility, rhythmically wise” says DY Ngoy, the
Congolese executive producer with whom Omordia created “Africa Concert
Series”, a year-long recital by musicians of African descent at London’s October
Gallery: “what is fantastic about her CD [“Ekele”] is that she played the music of
African composers and made it relevant to our time”. Examples of monthlythemes for the African Concert Series include “String Quartets by African
Composers”, “African Art Music for Woodwind”, “Arabesque: Piano Music from the
Arab World” and “The South African Bass”.
“It’s a great project that Rebeca has started and i commend her” says Chi-Chi
Nwanoku OBE, the British-Nigerian double bassist who founded Chineke Orchestra
alongside whom Omordia often performs: “there’s something else about playing
music by someone that comes from the country of your father land. Sometimes
there’s a familial feeling that you aren’t even aware that you’ve got, until you’ve
discovered it.” In April, OkayAfrica sat down with Omordia in London to discuss
her album “Ekele”, her current role as the Artistic Director of African Concert
Series and the history of classical music in Nigeria and Africa. The following are
edited excerpts from the interview.
How do you find the state of classical music in Nigeria today?
They have a very vibrant scene. I think the problem in Nigeria is the funding, and
the financial resources that are allocated for that. And because musicians these
musicians cannot afford living just from playing in an orchestra, they have to
look for other means of work, including teaching, playing gigs, doing concerts for
churches and this I believe in my own opinion takes their focus from what could
be one of Africa’s best and biggest orchestra.
That’s a huge claim to make.
Well, I think if MUSON [Music Society of Nigeria] had the resources, if they had
the personnel to really, really look after how they are organizing the event,
Nigeria would be the center of classical music in at least West Africa if not inAfrica. They have everything, they have the hall, they have instruments, they
have pianos, they even have the audience which they have built over the years.
In South Africa, they already we have the Western influence. And they have
different financial resources for art there but we are talking about West Africa,
Nigeria and all the African countries that have music schools, classical music
schools and orchestra.
Do you see yourself being part of this new shakeup any other way than visiting
and just going there to play concerts?
I am supporting MUSON and I am very happy to go there and perform. The
audience is really receptive and they really welcome me. Also the musicians,
there are musicians I have been working with.
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What is Nigerian Art Music?
Nigerian art music or African art music is a blend of Western classical music and
traditional rhythms and melodies. It was generated from Western classical music.
The father of Nigerian classical music, Fela Sowande (1905 – 1987) was an organ
player in a church where his father was a music director. He came to London to
study music and after doing that he became very known in London. He went back
to Nigeria to broadcast and to lecture and he used all the cult tunes, all the
traditional music in his compositions.
Today, a lot of the compositions by the pioneers of Nigerian Art Music are in
manuscript form and were never recorded. What are the reasons for this?The problem is not even just the recording, 95 percent of the music has never
been published. My research took such a long time to find the compositions. Some
of Ayo Bankole’s music was published but not all of them. So I had to get in touch
with his son, Ayo Bankole junior who’s a musician in Nigeria. Fred Onovwerosuoke
“24 Studies in African Music” is published under his own label, I would say, but
the rest of the music is not published. So then, of course it’s very difficult for
anybody, including, Africans to access it and then record it.
Because some of these composer’s work contain melodies or songs that
existed for ages before being notated into classical compositions, are they
mere translations and still regarded as original compositions?
Nobody has ever composed anything like that before. So I think they are original
composition. In that sense, for the Western world and also for the African world
this is something completely new. Because for the Western world, this music
might sound exerting because of the rhythm and because of the cues. Each piece,
or each composer they use melodies from the tribe they came from. Ayo Bankole
is Yoruba, so we see so many Yoruba songs there even Fela Sowande does that.
Christian Onyeji he’s in the Igbo song.
Can you give an example using any of the compositions on “Ekele”?
So for instance, Ayo Bankole’s piano sonata is completely original, even though he
is using the idiom of some Yoruba song. It’s not the actual Yoruba song. It’s not a
particular Yoruba song. Christian Onyeji’s “Ekele Diri Chineke” is an arrangement
of an already existing gospel Igbo song. So the tune itself is not his, it was from
the ’80s. It was sang by a gospel artiste and he arranged it in a Western classicalform. That’s why that song is called “arrangement”, his own arrangement. It’s not
his own composition.
Why is Ayo Bankole’s piano sonata the centerpiece of Ekele?
As a length and as a style and as a conception it’s the most solid work from a
Western classical point of view. Its construction is as a sonata which has a
Western classical structure and that already places Ayo Bankole as a classical
composer.
Is there anything else about technique perhaps that distinguishes the
compositions by African composers from that of others?
The rhythm has become a very strong element of the classical music but because
African rhythms, they are already so original, this changes the way you play a
classical piece because of the rhythm.
What is “African Pianism”?
Akin Euba totally invented African pianism which means he found the piano as a
Western instrument favorably for impressing certain elements of Nigerian
traditional music. So that’s why his pieces are very rhythm based, more than
melodic based. So then this will reflect on how the technique of writing the music
and also how the technique of playing the music and then the piano becomes
more of an instrument of percussion. It gets closer to the African or the Nigerian
traditional instrument. And can this be done with most of the other instruments
that are not traditional in Nigeria and Africa.
Tell me more about Akin EubaHe wrote things for cello and other instruments but he found the piano particular
close to expressing with other Nigerian instruments. It is known that piano is
quite a percussive instrument and it’s usually the job of the West in particular to
bring out the melodicity of the piano and to try to get over the percussive effect
but Akin Euba used it to his benefit. He was closer to expressing the traditional
Nigerian music that the African instrument would usually do.
Why was it important to include the shorter compositions – “Little Variations
For Ayo” and “Ya Orule” by Ayo Bankole?
They audience reaction works with that. They also have an important value
because his children Ayo junior and Femi his sister, they were raised to learn to
play the piano. So he wrote this for them so they will have what to play and
because both pieces they have their own element of Nigerian music, it would
have been easier for the children to practice that than to practice some very
Western traditional song that might be boring for them. They do stand next to the
biggest “miniature” work of the biggest Western composers.
What, to you, is special about Fred Onovwerosuoke’s “24 Studies in African
Rhythms”?
He is using same syllable staccato, percussor segment on the piano, which makes
it quite difficult for a pianist and for the hand to perform it and then he is using
the seven rhythms. Three plus four in a bar.
How will that go if you were to illustrate?
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.Oh, it’s just that.
Yeah, but it will be. One, two, three, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, one,
two, three, four, one, two, three, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, one,
two, three, four. To play this is quite difficult and then he’s mixing them. This will
be the starting rhythm at the base for the whole study and on top of that, he is
bringing other rhythms too. Okay, this could be quite an accessible rhythm to play
for a jazz pianist, but for a classical pianist, where you don’t really find rhythms
like that so often, it can be challenging because you are used to a different
composition style.
And the difficulty is what makes it exceptional?
I think from a pianist point of view, his work is the most original of all the African
composers because he’s not trying to stick to the Western style. He is already a
classical composer through his education but because he traveled Africa, he
wrote down materials, music, songs from all these countries and all the tribes and
he used them in “24 studies in African rhythms”. That’s why he is not just a
composer he’s an abnormal musicologist as well. He used, in every study, a
completely different rhythm such as the music melodies in Ethiopia, in Ghana,
everywhere in Africa he traveled. So this is really, really exceptional.
Is it always clear what compositions are based on specific melodies from
specific countries? How do you distinguish one from the other?
You will notice even if you are not a musician, you will notice, from the rhythms
and the melodies, how different they are. There’s a piece, it’s a lullaby fromCongo, and it does seem like a lullaby, and it has all the elements of a lullaby but
then the tune itself, even if you have not listened to Congo music, you will know
that this is something Africa.
Bartok is a said to be a strong influence on Fred O’s approach to the piano.
Can you explain why?
It was easy for him to adopt Batok even though Batok was inspired by African
rhythm himself. Because they have a common element. Bato made musical
language his rhythm and he also was inspired by Africa. Because he traveled and
he was inspired by Northern Africa. That’s where he even got his rhythm. It was
easy for Fred to adopt Batok even though Batok was inspired by African rhythm
himself.
In an old interview you spoke briefly about one of your first tutors who, when
she passed, bequeathed her entire collection of CDs – over 400 – to you. Could
you tell me more about how formative the relationship was for you?
There were many people that had really influenced my growing up as an artiste.
That particular lady was so special because I grew up with her. We are talking
about a relationship that lasted over a decade. She was my first or second piano
teacher and I worked with her for six, seven years. And after I finished working
with her we stayed friends and I used to go and visit her on weekly basis and we
would discuss about music. And even though I had stopped working with her as a
pianist, then she took over raising me as an artiste and as a musician. We would
listen to recordings and analyze and even after I graduated from university, she
would be writing me letters. We will be discussing music and then I will visit herand even when I moved to the UK, every time I would come back she would know
that I had come back. The following day I must have lunch with her. Well the
lunch is not just talking about catching up. In the end, we will be listening to
recordings or something that she discovered because she was really with
everything that was new, with all the new pianists and she had the latest
recordings at that age.
You tell me why are these particular arrangements special to you? What about
them is special?
It’s the most difficult piece for cello and piano. For a pianist because it’s almost
like a piano concerto. Very difficult technique, both at the same time you are
playing with a cellist. So you have to have, how will I say “double attention” to
what you are playing towards music a partner will be doing. Actually, in every
musicians’ life because of their personality because of their intellectual ideas,
you will always find a particular composer you relate to and you might find.
Whatever your interest in music, it’s closer to how you see music and the world in
general and in the last period of his life. I think it’s a fantastic piece. It really
suits my personality, my temperament and my technique.
What is special about performing to a live audience?
Every concert is special because every concert is completely different. This is also
the excitement about it that there is no concert that is the same. And you never
know how it’s going to go.
Can you single out a memorable moment?
One of the most important solo concerts was, I think, the first time my father
came to my concert [Romania, late 1990s]. After the concert he told me that
tears came into his eyes when he was listening to a particular piece. And it
reminded him of where he was from in Delta State. I think it was Beethoven’s
sonata.