Paper short abstract:

Saheed Osupa, a Nigerian 21st century fuji musician, melds elements of social and cultural practices as a brand of postcolonial civilisation. The paper focuses on the implication of this and the patronage of the urbanised Alaafin of Oyo on the aesthetics of court entertainment in his kingdom.

Paper long abstract:

Urbanisation and the ethno-cultural changes thereon typify the melding of ancient vestiges with modern tastes, which manifest as customised diversity of resources to influence forms of traditional arts and recreation. Up until the 1980's in Nigeria, court entertainments were traditionally structured. The norm was a coliseum of palace crew, numbered by royal drummers, court jesters, royal singers and other players of special instruments rendered for recreation and ritual. However, the urbanisation of most of the ancient cities in contemporary Nigeria has initiated a process which lends patronage to modern rural society, whereby the palace crew now include urbanised Juju bands introducing foreign and modern musical instruments such as keyboards, guitars, trumpets, and deploying sophisticated microphones, mixers and loudspeakers and combos. It is against this backdrop that the paper interrogates a contemporary Fuji musician Saheed Osupa's 2009 musical video Eta Oko, performed at the historic celebration of the naming ceremony of a set of triplets born to the Alaafin of Oyo Alaiyeluwa Oba Lamidi Adeyemi. Both artist and royalty have in common the fact of being urban imports to rural community; thus, they iconize postcolonial modernity. The paper, therefore, takes a postcolonial stance in comparatively examining the paradigm shift between ancient and contemporary court entertainment in the Kingdom of Oyo; while particularly expounding on the role-play of the cosmopolite royal character and the sprawling impact of hybridised popular artist on the architecture of traditional court of entertainment.