First Nigerian Musician To Win A Grammy Award (2008)
Sikiru may not be a household name but he should be. He is currently the first and only Nigerian musician to have won a Grammy Award, a feat is achieved at the 51st Annual Grammy Awards in 2008 for his Global Drum Project. His win came in the Best Contemporary World Music Album category.
A Nigerian drummer and percussionist whose collaborations range from Sir Shina Peters to Carlos Santana.
Technically his first win should be considered his second, because in
1994 he was credited by Grammys on another win – he was only named as a collaborator and not a primary creator.
Born in November 1952, Sikiru was born to Chief Ayanleke Adepoju and
Mrs Adepoju in Ibarapa, Oyo State. He was born into a lineage of drummers.
His great-great-grandfather down to his father all carried the name, ‘Ayan’ which is a Yoruba identifier for drummers by trade and heritage.
We cannot mention great Nigerian heroes without mentioning the icon that is Professor Wole Soyinka. Born
July 13th 1934 in Abeokuta in the South-West Region of Nigeria. Professor Soyinka (or simply ‘Prof’ as he is fondly called) has transcended Literature. Prof is a bonafide cultural phenomenon.
A precocious and inquisitive child, Prof grew up in an Anglican mission compound where he learned Christian teachings from his father, as well as the Yoruba spiritualism and tribal customs from his grandfather.
He moved to England in the 1950s to further his tertiary education at the prestigious University of Leeds where he served as the Editor of the campus magazine, The Eagle. By the end of the 1950s, Prof started to make a name for himself with his play, A Dance of the Forests, which satirized the Nigerian political elite. In 1960, he was awarded a Rockefeller fellowship and returned to Nigeria to study African drama.
In 1986, Prof had his life changing moment when he
became the recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature becoming the first African man to receive the prestigious prize. He made headlines for dedicating his iconic speech to Nelson Mandela.
Prof has decade upon decade, created an incredible body of work that firmly solidifies him as a playwright, poet, author and teacher. And more than that, he has lent his voice to some of the most decisive political moments in our nation’s history. Most notably, during the civil war in Nigeria when he appealed in an article for a cease-fire. He was arrested for this in 1967 and held as a political prisoner for 22 months until 1969. More recently, during the 2015 elections, he worked the phone to monitor reports of voting irregularities, technical issues, and violence. These are just a few reasons many regard him as a political activist.