Just like that, Felabration is here again. Lovers of Afrobeat would recall that the first three words in this write-up are the title of one of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti’s hit songs. That is also the tag for this year’s edition of the annual festival conceived by the Afrobeat legend’s first child, Yeni Kuti, to celebrate the life, times and music of Fela. The week-long event now takes place across several venues in Nigeria and beyond.
But what shape will Felabration 2015, which traditionally begins a week earlier with a school’s debate at the Freedom Park, Lagos on October 6 this year, and holds from Monday, October 12 to Sunday, October 18 at the New Africa Shrine and other venues, take? Three people, who are involved one way or another, that spoke with TheNiche threw light on this year’s edition. They are CEO of Zmirage, Teju Kareem; iGroove Radio’s DJ, RayBee Bola Brown; and a Fela aficionado, Okwechima Abdul.
Kareem, who was there at the inception of the festival, said they were returning after a hiatus “because we don’t abandon a project”.
His company, he said, was there at the very first edition of Felabration.
“We put our technical prowess behind it to the level that it has not been experienced again after that. Fela deserves the best of arts elements that can come into pursuing and carrying further his message. This is because Fela himself is an epitome of refined and classical work. In that sense, his music attains precision,” he said.
He explained that the Afrobeat legend’s calculations in music were not any different from the cutting knife of a surgeon or from the exactness of a pilot landing a plane.
“Fela played his music with precision and we must also contribute at that level. That is what Fela is all about. We were there at the beginning; we took the back seat, but we just cannot abandon it,” Kareem reiterated.
Although Zmirage will not be involved in the technical aspect of Felabration, the company is responsible for bringing into the country the London Afrobeat Collective, the United Kingdom-based band Kareem ran into during a trip there.
“We saw the work that has the same spirit in terms of human endeavour reside in the London Afrobeat Collective when I ran into their show. I saw that same precision of Fela in the way they render and deliver the music. These are all Caucasians, except one. And I am saying Fela has become exportable; not just exportable, he has been imbibed, has been reincarnating in the white body. This is good enough a testimony for the nation called Nigeria, for the continent called Africa that our own ingenuity is also ‘copy-able’ by the other races,” he declared.
iGroove Radio’s DJ, RayBee Brown, is coordinator Felabration at the Freedom Park, Lagos venue and confirmed that the London Afrobeat Collective will indeed be playing at the colonial prison turned theme park.
“Like in the past four years or thereabouts, Freedom Park is going to be a major alternative venue for Felabration. Most of the foreign artistes perform at the (New Africa) Shrine and also at Freedom Park, which is the venue for those ones that would not like to ‘cross the bridge’. Some people are actually scared of going to the Shrine, so the Felabration Committee decided to take Felabration closer to the Islanders. That is more or less what Felabration Freedom Park is about,” the DJ said.
Adding Third World from the United States of America (U.S.A.) and Nuwen Afrobeat band from Chile to the list of confirmed performers, Brown said these two groups like the London Afrobeat Collective are more than likely to perform at both venues.
“There will be some bands from Ghana, Kenya and other places which have not yet confirmed. Then our local artistes, the regulars that play on a weekly and monthly basis at Freedom Park, are expected to still have shows within that week, and various bands that have passed through Freedom Park since it opened,” Brown explained.
Brown, who said those who come to Freedom Park for Felabration will get a live music experience, stated that the hope is that Femi Kuti will have the time as main organiser and host of Felabration to come to Freedom Park and perform.
“Afropolitan Vibes will also be taking place in-between that period,” the DJ who keeps Freedom Park rocking said.
Malam Abdul, on his part, said that this year’s edition will be awesome.
“Every year, Felabration comes differently because it is the biggest festival in the west coast of Africa celebrating the life, times and music of Fela. This year at the lectures, Sandra Isadore will be here. She was the one that changed Fela’s music to Afrobeat by talking to him when he was in America in 1969 under the invitation of the Black Panther Movement of America,” he said.
He explained that she is going to speak at the symposium on the title, ‘Human Rights as my Property’. Also to speak is chairman of the Nigeria Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Prof. Chidi Odinkalu; Kunle Ajibade, a journalist; and Ayo Obe, a human rights activist. The immediate past Lagos State governor, Babatunde Fashola, will chair the event, which is the annual Fela Debates and will take place on the morning of October 12 at the NECA House, Central Business District, Alausa, Ikeja, Lagos.
For the performers this year, Abdul said the earlier mentioned Third World reggae band, London Afrobeat Collective and Nuwen Afrobeat band from Chile will be coming. Also to perform, he told TheNiche, is Lauryn Hill.
“Alicia Keys and her husband are coming as guests. They are not coming to play. They are great followers of Fela and Femi’s music,” Abdul stated.
The veteran art journalist mentioned Terra Kulture and Kalakuta Museum as the other venues where Felabration is billed to take place.
“Don’t forget that there is Felabration all over the world. In London, where they are showing the Finding Fela film, they are doing a concert on Fela’s birthday, October 15. In Osaka, Japan, too. It is like that all over the world now, growing in leaps and bounds,” he said.
When the issue of sponsorship for this year came up, Abdul said corporate Nigeria needs to explain why it was not investing in the Fela brand.
“The whole world is looking at (Fela) now. Everybody is making money out of him, with musicians remixing his beats. Everybody but Nigerian corporate bodies are still shy,” he said.
But the Fela crowd is not shy. Also not shy are the regular sponsors like Seven Up Bottling Company, Kasapreko (Alomo Bitters), Promasidor, which sponsors the school debate, and the Lagos State government.
What is left is for everyone to put on their dancing shoes and reflect on the Ideology and legend that is Fela.
