The Apagya Show Band - Unreleased LP 1973/74

 

Apagya Show Band – unreleased Essiebons LP of the No.1 “Afro Band” of the 1970s in Ghana, ft. Ebo Taylor, Gyedu Blay-Ambolley, Bob Pinodo, “the Showmaster of Ghana”, and Ebo Dadson on sax. Compulsory!

 

Tracklist

01. Kwaakwa (03:51)

02. Kusi Na Se Bo (03:65)

03. I'm Black (03:54)

04. Serwa Brakatu (04:03)

05. Wana Na Koko (04:10)

06. Ma Nesrew Me (04:03)

07. Abotare (04:01)

08. Kyekyer Pe Awa (05:01)

09. Peace and Love (04:34)

10. Mumude (03:13)

11. Dofo Nye Ekyir (04:10)

12. Nsamanfo BabyBaby (04:52)

13. Kweku Ananse (03:32)

essiebons.com 

Femi Kuti talking about Fela (March 2013)

Why I Didn’t Talk To Fela For Six Years

Fela Anikulapo’s son, Femi, tells OLUFEMI ATOYEBI and GBENGA ADENIJI what people didn’t know about the late Afrobeat musician.

Why did your father choose a controversial lifestyle?

It was because he was too honest about his way of life. He liked women and he did not hide it. He liked to smoke marijuana and he did it in the open. Many people like women but they do it secretly. There are so many brothels all around the world but Fela never patronised them, many people go there to pay for s**x.
You will be shocked to know the number of people that smoke marijuana in Nigeria and all over the world. I hope you know that some countries are legalising the smoking of marijuana now. He was truthful about his way of life while many of us are hypocritical about ours. Many people were envious that he was too honest and bold and that was why there were so many controversies about his life.

Most of his friends who are highly-placed admire women even girls young enough to be their daughters. They leave their matrimonial homes to meet them secretly. Some of them hide in hotels to do what they cannot do in the open. Many of them smoke but they are not brave enough to say they smoke. All the call girls you see on Allen Avenue, who picks them? Fela never did.

How was he able to manage his many wives?

It was very stressful for him. Do not forget that he divorced all of them. They were not faithful to him. When he decided to marry them, he did so for a reason. He said they had been with him in difficult times. They endured police harassment and beating. But they never left. Though they were very loyal to him, they still had a bad image in the public because people were calling them prostitutes.

He felt that the best way to protect them was to marry them. They became Fela’s queens, so the society had to respect them. I believe he loved them and he was already sleeping with them before he married them. It was not really a big deal to anybody that knew them. For instance, my mother knew this was happening so it was not a hidden thing. The big deal was how he was able to convince the 27 of them to marry him same day.

Did Fela talk you into music?

He did not influence me as such. I always knew I would go into music. It was just a question of how and when. He was however a big motivation in my life because every child wants to be like his or her father. The son of a plumber will want to be like his father, especially if he is learning the trade early. If the son loves the father, he will want to emulate him. I am not a different son. I love my father and wanted to do what he was doing. The only question hanging over that ambition was whether I could fulfil that ambition perfectly.

How did he punish any of his children who misbehaved?

He beat us. In fact, I was the one who got the most beating in the house when we were young.

Can you remember things you did that made him beat you?

I stole my mother’s £1 to buy chewing gum one day. You can imagine how many wraps of chewing gum that money would buy. They were not less than 100. My friend convinced me to go and steal the money but we were caught while chewing the gum. When my father asked me where I got the money from, I was speechless. I was still thinking of what to say when he started beating me with his hand. He then warned me never to steal again.

He also beat me when he caught me with cigarette in 1969. My mother used to smoke and he saw me put the cigarette in my mouth. I did not really smoke the cigarette because it was not lit, I only put it in my mouth but it angered him when he saw what I did. He beat me again and warned me not to touch cigarette again.
Why do you think it has been difficult to replicate Fela’s style of music?

It is so because the foundation of the band was truthful. He was not pretentious. He really believed in what he was saying. Despite all the police harassment, he was not moved. Many people would have gone to seek political asylum in another country but Fela did not do that. He had so many opportunities outside Nigeria and he would have taken advantage of them to run away from his enemies. These are the things that every generation admires in him.

What are those things you imbibed from your father?

I may not be able to mention them. In the way I deal with people, I am very truthful. If I say I am going to do something, I would do it. But I am more of my mother than my father. My elder sister has more of my father than I do. I am more of a practical person. If I plan to do something, I will think of the consequences. My father would never weigh any decision before executing it. If he planned to go to Dodan Barracks, he would just go there. As for me, I make plans before I do anything. My father would not write a Will. But because I know that I could get killed, I had written my Will a long ago.

I know that in a divorce case, my wife could claim one third of my property, so I would not go into wedlock. The most important thing to me right now are my children. Now, I will not play to the gallery. I will not say because people love me, they must come first before my family. Who are my family? My children of course. So, whether you love me or not, I will let you know that my children come before you, take it or leave it. I live this way because I learnt from my father’s life, the decisions he took and the consequences. When you learn from someone, you don’t have to do what he did. Fela did what he did for his own reasons. I cannot criticise why he did what he did.

Also, we must remember the stardom. Nobody was as big as my father. He had over 100 people around him daily when he became a star. I cannot live like that because I don’t want too many people around me. I saw what people did to him. It was too much. I can keep the Afrika Shrine open to everybody but not my house.

If you come to my home, you will only see me, my kids and may be my girlfriend. Sometimes, my friends visit but I don’t keep a crowd around for any reason, my father did. I like women but I saw the harassment he went through with 27 wives. It is not that I don’t want 27 wives but I know what will happen because of what happened to my father. I can’t tell a woman that I will be faithful in our relationship. That was part of the problem of my marriage. I cannot be faithful. I will not lie about that. It is not that I cannot be faithful, but I cannot start my relationship by saying I am going to be faithful till death do us part. There are possibilities that if another woman comes and I like her, I cannot give the assurance that I will not have an affair with her. I have no intention whatsoever to bring all of them under one roof. My intention now is to cater for my children and do my job to the best of my ability.

Did Fela have any special food?

He ate any food. He liked cakes and ice cream too. I don’t like cakes. I can eat ice cream and chocolate once in a while but my father loved them all. If somebody is celebrating and there is a cake, I can take a little piece not to offend my host. My father could die for cakes. If you visited him and looked inside his refrigerator, you would see lots of cake in it.

Your father did not hide his hatred for western medicine. Is it the same with you?

I grew up not liking tablets too. I grew up to be a traditionalist like my dad. But I later realised that there are too many fake traditional medicine in our society. The government must understand that many of these herbs are claiming the lives of our people. We must ask ourselves which of the herbs has been scientifically proven to cure malaria and the ailment they claim to cure. I once had malaria and I drank herbs but I was not cured. I felt very uncomfortable. I will not say that herb does not work because Africa believes in it. It is a fact that we did survive before orthodox medicine came.

There was African traditional medicine, but where is it today? Everywhere, you will see people hawking herbs, saying it work for this and that. People buy them and mix with hot drinks. Really, when you are mixing alcohol with herbs, you are damaging your liver. While you think you are curing one thing, if it does work, you are damaging another thing in your body. Until we have concrete fact to say something works for the body, we will be deceiving ourselves.

Why do you think Fela hated former President Olusegun Obasanjo?

Olusegun Obasanjo was a bad leader. He did not do well for Nigeria. He ruled this country three times but has nothing to show for it. They called the soldiers that burnt Kalakuta Republic and killed my grandmother unknown soldiers. The Federal Government is yet to apologise for their action against the Kuti family. Whether they like it or not, Fela was one of the biggest stars from Africa. As the days go by, people are beginning to understand the importance of his music. The Lagos State Government is building a museum in his honour. The family does not have that kind of money to build a museum. It is not the governor’s money but the state government money. But the governor took the decision on behalf of the people.

Another museum is also being built Ogun State. Governors are beginning to understand that Kuti’s name cannot be swept under the carpet. The family has done so much for Nigeria and the world. Many people are playing afrobeat style of music today because Fela invented it. Some people are saying he did not start it. But the question is: Who started it and stood firm using the music creatively? Fela stood for many great things and his contribution to the society cannot be pushed aside.

Did he have time to take the family out for leisure?

In 1967, I remember that he took us to Onikan swimming pool and also Federal Palace Hotel. That was the first and last outing for fun with us. He always made it clear that he was not a conventional father. He did not want us to go to school not because he did not like education, but because he believed that education was colonial. He believed that it was structured to show that Europe is supreme and Africa is not good. Even when he took me out of school in my fourth year in secondary school, I had acquired vast knowledge about the outside world through the books I read at home. I was known as a professor in the Kalakuta Republic. I read books such as Blackman and Walter Rodney’s How Europe Underdeveloped Africa. I read so much that I even found there was a Pharaoh Kuti in Egypt. I wondered if this Egyptian Pharaoh Kuti was in any way related to the Kuti family in Nigeria. My father said we are probably related.

Which school were you attending before Fela made that decision?

I was studying at Baptist Academy and he withdrew me from there when Obasanjo deployed soldiers to the school. I later went to Igbobi College and spent a year. He advised me to leave the school in form four. Many believed I would become a nonentity because of his action. There was disagreement within the family, my mother was against it, but my dad stood his ground. She wondered why my dad took me out of school when he went to one of the best schools in the UK.

She also said since he did not teach me music how then would I be great in life? My father told her not to worry that I would be great. I was not happy too and did not speak to him for six years. He told me that he was confident that I would be great. I did not know what he saw in me. The day my album, Wonder Wonder, became popular and I was becoming a household name in Nigeria, he called our family members and told them that the same boy he withdrew from school had become a successful musician.

At that time, it was only my father and King Sunny Ade that were travelling abroad frequently for musical concerts. But I suddenly started travelling abroad more than the two of them because I was becoming known more outside the country.

Will I do the same for my son? No. He will get a good education. I will let him understand street life which I grew up to know so that he will have a feel of it, but he must be formally educated.

Where were you when soldiers invaded Kalakuta Republic?

I was coming back from the school when I saw the soldiers. They wanted to arrest me. But I managed to escape through a place called Alagbole behind Kalakuta. I ran and went to pick my younger sister at Mary Magdalene Primary School. We then crossed over the railway and went home.

Is there anything you miss about Fela?

I miss his being a grandfather. I think he would have been a fantastic grandfather. He had already been showing the signs with my sister’s daughter and my son. He died in 1997 and my son was born in 1995. I know that what he was not able to do for us, he would have done for our children if he were still alive.


saharareporters.com

From Spain: Eskorzo Afrobeat Experience

Talking about Eskorzo is talking of debauchery. Their incendiary blend of danceable rhythms: rock, reggae, funk, soul, Balkan rhythms, Mediterranean, ska or tango makes them one of the most emblematic of bands on Spanish "latino" and world music scene. From now you can also associate their name to the syncopated beats of the heart of Africa.

Coincidences, or perhaps fate, 2012 has been a year of celebrations for the band as proves the launch of their fifth album "El Encanto de lo Irreverente, 15 años en directo" (translation: The Charm of the Irreverent, 15 years on stage") (CD + DVD). Just the same year which marks 15 years without Fela Kuti, revolutionary musician, creator of afrobeat, Pan-Africanist, African cultural icon and international star. A source of inspiration for musicians and music workers, whose legacy continues to spread like wildfire ...

A gunpowder that has finally soaked into the souls of this band from Granada (Spain), exploding under the name of ESKORZO AFROBEAT EXPERIENCE, a 100% Afrobeat adventure!

The wick that ignite this new side project was after Afrobeat Project cultural association and Enlace Funk magazine proposed them to record a cover Fela´s "Roforofo Fight" for their album "Music is the Soul of the Future: A Tribute to Fela From Spanish Bands". Like an addictive therapy, Afrobeat´s hypnotic rhythms have been seizing band members with an increasing passion. So much so that they have created a new repertoire of Afrobeat covers of all-time radio hits soon to be available in the audience´s hands.

In March 4th 2013, ESKORZO AFROBEAT EXPERIENCE present their first work with a 4-track EP, which will be available exclusively on vinyl and digital formats. No gimmicks, raw and rooted, this EP will show all the energy lived in the studio as songs are recorded live. A release which will include a making-of the best studio moments.

 

eskorzoafrobeat.bandcamp.com 

Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou - The Skeletal Essences Of Voodoo Funk (by analogafrica)

 

Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou is arguably West Africa’s best-kept secret. Their output, both in quantity and quality, was astonishing. During several trips to Benin, Samy Ben Redjeb managed to collect roughly 500 songs which Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou had recorded between 1970 and 1983.

The cultural and spiritual riches of traditional Beninese music had an immense impact on the sound of Benin’s modern music. Benin is the birthplace of Vodun (also Vodoun, or, as it is known in the West, Voodoo), a religion which involves the worship of some 250 sacred divinities. The rituals used to pay tributes to those divinities are always backed by music. The majority of the complex poly-rhythms of the vodun are still more or less secret and difficult to decipher, even for an accomplished musician. Anthropologists and ethnomusicologists agree that this religion constitutes the principal “cultural bridge” between Africa and all its Diasporas of the New World and in a reflection of the power and influence of these sounds many of the complex rhythms were to have a profound impact on the other side of the Atlantic on rhythms as popular as Blues, Jazz, Cuban and Brazilian music.

Two Vodun rhythms dominate the music of Orchestre Poly-Rythmo: Sato, an amazing, energetic rhythm performed using an immense vertical drum, and Sakpata, a rhythm dedicated to the divinity who protects people from smallpox. Both rhythms are represented here mixed in with Funk, Soul, Crazy organ sounds and Psychedelic guitar riffs. Bandleader Melome Clement explains: “Sato is a traditional rhythm derived from Vodun. It is used in Benin during annual rituals in memory of the dead; you can’t just play Sato at any given time. Sato is also the name of a drum which is used during the ceremonies. It’s huge: about 175 centimeters high. The drummers, armed with sticks, dance around it and hit it all at the same time. It’s very coordinated. The Sato drummers are backed by an orchestra of smaller drums and shakers. We also did some modern versions of a Vodun rhythm called Sakpata.  

 ukfestivalguides.com

---

Take funk, soul, psychedelia and rumba, mix it up with a thick dose of heavy local rhythms and throw everything in a Benin grinder. The brew is then mixed up with hypnotic Farfisa solos, gritty guitar riffs, distorted bass lines, warm horns and the result, of exorcizing proportion, will lead to frenetic body movements. Some people bang their heads, others jerk their feet or feel an urgent need to get up and start shaking their hips. One thing is common, though, to everyone who submits their ears to a spinning record by the mighty Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou: you simply can't stand still. And this new compilation is proof of that - here are 14 funky tracks by the legendary ensemble from Benin that has been deemed as "West-Africa's best kept secret," or as the "The D.N.A. of voodoo groove".  

hhv.de

 

Tracklist

01 Ne Rien Voir, Dire, Entendre
02 Houzou Houzou Wa
03 Adjro Mi
04 Karateka
05 Akoue We Gni Gan
06 N´Goua
07 Houton Kan Do Gome
08 A O O Ida
09 Vi E Lo
10 Pourquoi Pas?
11 Akue We Non Houme
12 Ai Gabani
13 Ecoutes Ma Melodie
14 Min We Tun So

Pierre Antoine ‎– Kalabuley Woman

Afrobeat double sider, surely one of the hardest things to find in the genre out of French speaking West Africa & definitely the best thing I've ever heard from this region. 2 long killer tracks. Guitar by Sammy Cropper from VIS A VIS band of Ghana, female vocals by Lola Everett who used to sing together with Ghanaian Pat Thomas who also used to play with the legendary Marijata group. 

It began with Fela ...

Originally published by dummymag.com

On August 12th 1997, in his birthplace of Lagos, Nigeria, the funeral of Fela Kuti took place. One million people attended. If anything can express the immense adoration of Nigerian people for the most famous African musician of the modern age, it is that one million of his fellow countrymen came to pay their respects. Some even danced around his open grave as live music sounded across the crowds, spurring them on to express their love for him and his work in a way that Fela would surely have seen fit. Multi-instrumentalist, Afrobeat pioneer, social and political activist, human rights advocate, serial womaniser, AIDS victim, sonic revolutionary; many descriptions have been attributed to the man who captivated millions across the world with his outspoken beliefs and oft-criticised personal life, but the legacy that endures most vividly is that of the radical, awe-inspiring music that continues to influence a myriad of artists worldwide.


Now, to celebrate his life and legacy, the complete works of Fela Kuti have been re-packaged and re-released by Manhattan-based Knitting Factory Records/Kalakuta Sunrise, after the former was granted the license from the Fela Anikulapo Kuti Estate for the global re-release of his catalogue. Totalling an incredible fifty albums’ worth of music, the joint label venture have scheduled an ambitious three-batch re-launch between March and September of this year, which kicked off this month with ‘The Best of The Black President 2’, a double CD of 12 tracks ranging chronologically from Fela’s political awakening in the late 1970s after visits to the USA and Ghana (Everything Scatter, Sorrow Tears and Blood) to the early 1990s and his ode to Thomas Sankara after his assassination (Underground System Part 2). Each track from ‘The Best of The Black President 2’ and onwards will have detailed written commentary from noted Afrobeat historian Chris May, as well as specially commissioned artwork and photography.

To celebrate the release of ‘The Best of The Black President 2’, and in anticipation of the release of Kuti’s entire recorded catalogue, we asked musicians, DJs and taste-makers who love Kuti to tell us just what it is about the man that so inspires and informs them. From the first time they heard his music, the anxious, decade-long efforts to collect it and the way his sound shapes the mindset and tastes of producers across a wide variety of musical genres and disciplines, hearing these testimonies of love and loss speak to the enduring impact of Fela Kuti’s music, and serves as an apt prelude to the re-release of his work.

Here’s to you, Fela.

Auntie Flo

I’m writing this in the aftermath of our final Highlife night at the Sub Club in Glasgow as part of a residency that has taken place over the past 18 months. The night was given the theme of ‘It Began In Africa’, a commonly used phrase that refers to the birth of rhythm in music coming from pre-historical Africa. For me, however, ‘It’ really began with Fela. Fela Kuti (in a similar vein as Bob Marley) embodied a nation, created a voice for his countrymen, gave birth to a whole new musical genre in Afrobeat and continues to posthumously bring fresh eyes and ears to Nigeria and the African continent in general.

I’ve read books, seen documentaries and watched the musical over the last few years which tell Fela’s life story, and for those not familiar with it I would recommend that they’re your first port of call. Following the music, of course. Music-wise, there is a ton of it! Seemingly never ending, the originals are either almost impossible to find or in terrible condition, so it’s fantastic that re-issues are now being put out.

A couple of years ago, I was given the opportunity of warming up for Fela’s son Femi Kuti and his live band in the Arches in Glasgow. The concert gave me a glimpse into what it must have been like to witness Fela playing one of his all night sessions at the Shrine in Nigeria. He and his band would play live all night, for hours and hours on end. Like most music being made for a specific context Fela’s music was made for this setting, creating tracks that could seemingly perpetuate endlessly without getting boring. When Femi played the lasted for over three hours, but similarly could have lasted forever. For me this was a new experience when listening to a band as I, like I’m sure many people, have that moment an hour or so into any band’s performance where legs start getting tired and no matter how good it is, you start to think you’ve got your money’s worth.

This gig, although very much a band performance, felt much more like a club night with a DJ playing records. Except it was all live! In this sense I believe that Fela Kuti was one of the world’s first DJs; being able to build up long sets over the course of a whole night, whipping the crowd into a frenzy in doing so, in the same vein to any Panorama Bar DJ. Much is made of Fela the political freedom fighter, the womaniser, the musical pioneer, the dope smoker, but Fela the DJ is something that resonates for me as much as any of the above.

Ghostpoet

Fela made me understand that talking about everyday life through music wasn’t a crime, but a necessity. He taught me that being true to yourself is worth more then any riches, fame or status. Fela was making music in a time where civil unrest, fear and oppression were rife – a time way before the internet, social media and streaming – but his words burned bright like a beacon for all to see. He sold and created nothing but the truth as he saw it, conjuring up compositions that the average man or woman on the street could understand, appreciate and take to their hearts.

The lessons I’ve learned from him as a person and through playing his music for many a year have subconciously soaked deep into my brain. Maybe it was some sort of subliminal message in the talking drums or call and response of the brass? Who knows… The sense of mystery and drama has always sat well with me, and that rough and ready essence is a feeling I can never quite stray far from in my own work.

To choose one favourite Fela track is a task in itself but if I had to choose just one, I would say Water No Get Enemy. That brass intro causes goosebumps everytime, that guitar groove and the hypnotic bass always get the hips moving and only Fela Kuti could compose a song about something as supposedly simple as water and create a piece of Afrobeat history.

Jesse Hackett

Confusion Break Bones was first played to me by my close friend and Pipe Down NTS Radio show partner Otis Marchbank. It’s a track from one of the last records Fela recorded in 1992, and marks a departure from some of his more well known Afrobeat classics.

Harmonically, it seems to have a menacing atonality and impending doom in its resonance. Sounding almost more like a Sun Ra track, its fugue-like, contrapuntal, syncopated organ parts have an off-kilter, sloping feel. I’m always strangely attracted to songs that have a kind of ‘wrong’ or ‘accidental’ energy to them; as if the musicians – their tuning and timing – were all a bit off-colour during the studio session. I think this track really epitomises that aesthetic. It has a bizarre, non-musically-correct sound that makes your average, pitch-perfect muzo wince in discomfort. It’s a dark track that grooves hard and rattles like a meat grinder on a cold lonely mission into sonic oblivion.

For all those who want to search beyond the tributaries of Water No Got Enemy or Zombie, check this strange little gem, its a twisted beauty!

JD Twitch

Fela Anikulapo Kuti.
Fela Ransome Kuti.
Africa 70.
Egypt 80.
Koola Lobitos.
Nigeria ’70.
Kalakutta Republik.
Who the hell is this guy?

I first heard of Fela Kuti when I was around thirteen years old. There was some very odd news piece in the NME about him visiting London and doing some crazy PR voodoo stunt that involved resurrecting a supposedly dead band member. Google sadly fails to bring anything up about this for me now, but I know I didn’t imagine it. Whatever, I was intrigued. As time went on I’d sporadically read more little snippets about him here and there, but there was absolutely no way for me to hear what his music sounded like. Bands I loved like 23 Skidoo would site him as a huge influence, which only made me more desperate to hear him.

Over the next decade or so I must have visited more than fifty record shops around the UK but I never once saw a copy of one of his records – nor did I ever meet anyone who had heard him. Those seem like prehistoric times compared with today; where with a couple of clicks I could have his entire back catalogue at my disposal. But, in hindsight, that almost 15 year wait was most definitely worth it. Perhaps it made me appreciate his music all the more when I finally heard it.

In 1997 the Barclay label in France released two six-album box sets of classic Fela albums. This in itself presented a dilemma. In 1997 I was dirt poor, and coming up with £70 for one of these boxes was quite a financial challenge. I managed to come up with the dough for one of the sets and proceeded to gorge myself on Afrobeat. What a revelation this music was! It was loose, vivid, rough around the edges, vital, life-affirming, joyous, powerful, political, endlessly hyper-kinetic. Those horns! The drums! The call and response vocals! The build up! That artwork! And of course, The Man. Fela!

His music was all I’d dreamed it would be and way, way more. A week later I sold some records so I could afford to buy the second box, and shortly after we started our Optimo nights. Optimo was initially very Fela heavy but sadly it seemed Glasgow audiences weren’t really ready for fifteen minute Afrobeat masterpieces and even now, in these Fela-literate times, it’s hard to pack a Glaswegian dance floor with raw unadulterated Fela unless it has been doctored and edited – and there are now endless unofficial Fela edits and remixes too. I now probably have almost every record he ever made, and I dream about one day doing an entire night devoted to his music. In the meantime, his music has led to me discovering all sorts of music from across Africa. Fela Kuti was the gateway drug to endless hours of pure musical joy for me.
 

Gilles Peterson

Ever since I first heard Roforofo Fight by Fela Kuti being played by DJ Paul Murphy in JAFFAS club on Tottenham Court Road in the autumn of 1984 I was enthralled by the depth and funk of this new music. As a DJ I’ve probably spun more Fela than most other music during the past 30 years… his music is timeless and never feels out of touch. It’s simply raw and rhythmic and dirty…no one can deny its power.

I’ve chosen Sorrow Tears and Blood as my Fela choice as this new elongated version has just appeared on a brand new Fela collection, ‘The Best of The Black President 2’… you can play this as warm up, wrap up or at peak time… Afrobeat perfection!


A "THANK YOU" for this article goes to ...

dummymag.com

From Ivory Coast: Jimmy Hyacinthe

His passion was the guitar. From his beginnings as a musician and amateur imitator until his confirmation as an instrumentalist talent, N'goran Jimmy Hyacinthe was faithful to this instrument which the Ivorian public and beyond the country, identify. Heir to the pop generation (1960-1970) he was the most outstanding figure in Côte d'Ivoire, he broke decisively with the art of Hendrix in the late 1970s and is now concerned to examine the heritage local musical Kode (subgroup Baoulé). He scored there, his artistic approach in line with a true quest for identity, following Ernesto Djedje.