This blog post is following my writer friend Malaka‘s comment saying — I’m the only person she knows who has vehemently insisted there are Christmas carols written and sung in Yoruba (my native language from Southwestern part of Nigeria) — 🙂 And there are really, traditional ones and one I incorporated here ‘Olugbala’, an original I wrote in 2012. However, in this post, I am sharing a homely informal spontaneous recording of a composition of my musical brother ‘Tosin’ who I’d spotlighted sometime ago on the blog . He did a quick fly by Atlanta a couple of weeks ago.. and we decided to do an impromptu acoustic recording of a Yoruba ‘Owambe’ (party vibe) Christmas Song he wrote.
Here’s wishing you all a fantastic Christmas filled with love, joy , peace and everything Jesus the reason for the season brings. Enjoy and share!
Tosin says:
I grew up in post-colonial Nigeria, but the residue of colonialism was still palpable enough to have some impact on the post-colonial kids. For instance, I had British teacher in elementary school, and a British principal in high school. So we kept to some “oyinbo” (Caucasian) mannerism. However, I was able to, and still, blossom in my African way of life through enculturation fostered by my parents and my surroundings. And my musical direction is a reflection of this way of life.With that said, I recently thought about doing an Afrikan Christmas Carol. Not that some African composers have never written some before, but I realized that we just repeat the same ol’ ones. So, on Wednesday morning (Dec. 10), the Heavens blessed me with a new composition. It was a few hours before my flight to Atlanta. And on getting to Atlanta I decided to do a quick collaboration with my Nigerian sister also called Tosin. The style of music I employed for this song is called Owambe.
Hope you enjoyed it!
Beautifully Dreaming… Positively Doing..
TOSINGER'S BLOG 