Intellect

Authors:  Myke O Olatunji 
DOI:

Keywords
Yabis, Pidgin English, Nigeria, popular music, political freedom, cultural revival

Abstract
When the late Nigerian Afro-beat proponent, Felá Aníkúlápó-Kútì (formerly known as Felá Ransome- Kútì) returned from a tour of the United States of America in 1970, his music witnessed a lot of transformation. First, he discarded with his erstwhile jazz-highlife style and came up with a new style he christened ‘Afro-beat’, a mixture of American jazz and Yorùbá folk music. Secondly, the content of his vocal music changed tremendously from abstract themes to day-to-day happenings among the common people in Nigeria. However, the protracted military rule in Nigeria, coupled with the large scale embezzlement and looting of the nation’s treasury (which undermined the democratic processes), as well as the promotion of large scale violence by the nation’s military junta, provided a new theme for Felá’s vocal music from the mid 1970s. Thus the stage was set for a new phenomenon among Nigerian popular music; music known as the Yabis music became a site for political engagement, through which those who governed through coercion were ridiculed and their bad policies subjected to derision in several lyrics of many Nigerian popular musicians who later joined Felá in the 1980s and after. This paper examines the role and impact of Yabis music on the Nigerian music scene, as well as her political and socio-cultural milieu.