Jùjú music

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Jùjú is a style of Nigerian popular music, derived from traditional Yoruba percussion. The name comes from Juju, a form of magic and the use of magic objects or witchcraft common in West Africa. It evolved in the 1920s in urban clubs across the countries. The first jùjú recordings were by Tunde King and Ojoge Daniel from the 1920s. The lead and predominant instrument of Jùjú is the talking drum. Some Jùjú musicians were itinerant, including early pioneers Ojoge Daniel, Irewole Denge and the "blind minstrel" Kokoro.[1]

Afro-juju is a style of Nigerian popular music, a mixture of Jùjú music and Afrobeat. Its most famous exponent was Shina Peters, who was so popular that the press called the phenomenon "Shinamania". Afro-juju's peak of popularity came in the early 1990s.

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[edit] History

Following World War II, electric instruments began to be included, and pioneering musicians like Tunde Nightingale, Fatai Rolling-Dollar, I. K. Dairo, Dele Ojo, Ayinde Bakare, Adeolu Akinsanya, King Sunny Adé, and Ebenezer Obey made the genre the most popular in Nigeria, incorporating new influences like funk, reggae and Afrobeat and creating new subgenres like yo-pop. Some new generation juju artistes include Oludare Olateju. Juju music, unlike apala, sakara, and fuji, was not created by Muslim Yoruba, and is therefore secular. Adé was the first to include the pedal steel guitar, which had previously been used only in American country music.

[edit] Performance

Jùjú music is performed primarily by artists from the southwestern region of Nigeria, where the Yoruba are the most numerous ethnic group. In performance, audience members commonly shower jùjú musicians with paper money; this tradition is known as "spraying."

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ Toyin Falola (2001). Culture and customs of Nigeria. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 173. ISBN 0313313385. 

[edit] External links