Hubert Ogunde

Hubert Ogunde (1916, -) is a Dramaturge Nigeria N considered as the father of the modern Théâtre in Nigeria.

Hubert Ogunde, an inventor missionary.

Hubert Ogunde, and the Party of Research in African Music

Introduction

Hubert Ogunde is inspired at the same time by the theater Alarinjo and the dances of the Egundun, of the recent compositions Yoruba of hymns, without forgetting the influence of the Lifting Theater of Ilorin, to found in 1944 a new theatrical practice in West Africa.

In 1943, the Church of Ebute Metta proposes in Hubert Ogunde, former professor and police officer to present a Opéra local songs (in Yoruba language) in order to finance the construction of a new church. The June 10th 1944 takes place the representation of the Opera the Garden of Eden and the Gold Throne in Glover Memorial Hall with Lagos. This work directed by Hubert Ogunde founds his search for a new theatrical and musical form Yoruba.

It respects the traditional structure of the program of the dances Egundun and the Alarinjo theater which start with a chorus of opening (song in unison), homage to the line of the ancestors and the guardian gods, followed narration danced and sung (without dialogs), and closed by a single song, followed by a collective dance during which the spectators are free to leave or to remain.

Its form is inspired, in its first work, of the operas in local language ordered by the Christian churches of Lagos. The originality of Ogunde is to associate with a formal work of order, a research on the use of the traditional songs in the context of the hall in concert. On the one hand he hustles temptation almost inevitable to imitate, by translating them into |Yoruba language, European traditional airs, while proposing to draw from the African cultural content. In addition he is unaware of, in the name of his silent partners, the powerful African cultural interdicts, the Tabou S polytheists since he is a Christian artist, and practices of the Théâtre of outdoor, aristocratic and ceremonial, founded on the principle of festival and not on that of representation.

Its formal rupture with the traditional Alarinjo theater and festivals consists in giving up the masks, discovering the actors, playing inside a building on a scene in Proscenium, using the appearances and disappearances which the bottom of scene allows, lights, to use the curtain of scene (but only for the transitions between the scenes) in order to leave the leisure to the spectators to comment on them. Thus while keeping a familiar program with the public, Hubert Ogunde makes the representation at the same time more visible and more comprehensible with the spectators, breaking with the distant and secret aspect (although of more festive appearance) of the traditional forms. Moreover publicity of this theater is written, in the shape of posters and of press articles, the representation is paying, which breaks completely with the spirit of brotherhood secretes and prohibitions (like the prohibition of the women for the Egundun dances) and of initiations. The troop itself is not made up apprentices or initiates, but actors, musicians of dancers and acrobats, initially amateurs then professional. The patronage of the Church and the public and either that of course princely is a material change taking into account the political weight of Obas (local kings), them personal capacity and of their formal orthodoxy.

History and works

Importance of the local culture

the Garden of Eden meets an enormous success, the fact of adding to a work of song a dramatic action and a certain realism (the pants of Adam are painted in black what gives the impression which it is entirely naked) is innovator and section with the style of the Opera of local songs which consisted of a species of Oratorio on bottom of organ and drums. Ogunde found a form at the same time original and popular, the population of Lagos then seeking this compromise between the forms of urban representations, but européo-centrists, and the traditional festivals of countryside evil adapted to the novel mode of life urban and often confused, but close and understandable.

This Opera of biblical source is followed of Africa and God ( Africa and God ) which pays homage to the work of the European missionaries. For these the first two operas, Ogunde worked with the chorus of the Church, this work remains about the order and of the Didactique religious. For the spectacles according to, Israel in Egypt (1945), Na buchadnezzar' S Reign years Belshazzaers' Feast gold two impious reign (the Reign of Nabuchonozzor and the Feast of Belshazzar or two reigns impious), it founds the Parti Search for African Music (African Music Research Party) of which the goal is “to go in-depth in the African music and the dance in order to preserve and to develop what was a source of joy and recreation for our ancestors”. Kuyinu is the deputy manager. The receipts of the productions financed by the Churches are versed with the Party. What is characteristic of these first spectacles is the intention to organize, to make presentable the African traditions. In reaction with the image of the primitive Africans and without decency diffused by Europeans, Ogunde wants at the same time to emphasize on the scene the Yoruba rich person heritage of the cultures and to give a worthy and acceptable image of it. It shows the faces and recovers the chests, it composes of the Christian songs on traditional melodies and rates/rhythms, thus legitimating the dance, the music by the Christian religion (carrying according to him civilization). In the same way the choice to announce the titles of the English spectacles and to present them in the same building as that where the colonists present works of Mozart, takes into account the awakening of the African national feeling, the doubts and ignorances of the public. These efforts are appreciated by the public and the representatives of the press of the nationalist parties Nigerians.

With the following part, King Solomon (King Solomon), Ogunde primarily devoted to its research on the traditional airs Yoruba d' Abeokuta, of Ibeju, Oyo, Ilorin, Island-Ife, etc It is however criticized (Ogunsheye, Daily Service, June 18th, 1945) for the stereotypes in the choices of costumes, thus the Egyptian women are in costumes hawaïens, etc Ogunde is addressed to a public which does not know yet the African universities and whose external culture is that which is diffused by the colonial cinemas and the missionaries. But by tackling the question of the form, Ogunsheye encourages Ogunde to continue an increasingly concerned work of Dramaturgie, increasingly ambitious with respect to its public.

In addition, it faces many problems to find actresses. Indeed, because of the stigmatization attached to the trade of actor, his actresses ended all up giving up their trade, especially after being married. Ogunde then found the parade with these résitances cultural: it Maria virtually with all her actresses. This stabilized its troop and even made that the number of actresses was too important, so much so that some were to play of the roles of man.

An political orientation

The spectacle which follows the King Solomon mark a turning, because Ogunde attacks a work in catch with the colonial company. Worse than Crime (Worse than the crime) is a spectacle which denounces the Esclavagisme and by extension the Colonialisme. The setting in scene of expectant mothers put on sale, old slaves as well as white sailors and men (slave and anti-slavery) denounces, while distracting by dances, songs and acrobatics. According to Daily Service this spectacle causes hilarity and passion in the public. The musics, the costumes and the decorations point out the traditional night festivals, which impress while reconciling the public with its culture. Is this a spectacle with message? It is known as there that the white man took the African people: “Which is black of color/Portait pearls with the neck”: “They came them to take/They made them them slaves of the world” while paying homage to the combat of Europeans anti Esclavagisme. The dramaturgy is more didactic than of combat, she is considered to be however rather dangerous so that the spectacle is interdict with Jos where Ogunde and Kuyinu have to undergo two nights of imprisonment and a Procès.

Worse than Crime (1945) can be regarded as one of the first political spectacles in Africa, by the support of the independence press during the business of Jos. It inaugurates a long and animated history dissenting spectacle of West Africa, and more particularly the Nigeria until Wole Soyinka, Nobel Prize of literature. To note already that prohibition is put at the account, according to the colonial authorities, of an ethnic conflict between a population of North (Jos) which would not like to receive the teaching of people of the South (Lagos) at the point to disturb a representation violently. The colonial police force, far from being caught some to the rioters, is caught of them with those which inspire these riots, i.e. with the artists themselves. After Worse than Crime , Ogunde undertakes a series of spectacles inspired by the oral literature of West Africa.

The Party of African Music research works in parallel with the Yoruba Cultural Group (Yoruba Farming Group) to reaffirm the cultural conscience Yoruba in urban environment. The spectacle Journey to Heaven mixes the Christian images with the myths Yoruba. Two twin sisters have opposed lives, one is simple and honest, the other dissolue, and is found with the sky. The gemellity and predestination are constants of the accounts Yoruba. Always in 1945, The Black Forest (the Black Forest) recalls the tales of Tutuola (the Palwine Drinkard, Life in the Bush off Ghosts) written more than 15 years later. Ugunmola will be also of the same inspiration. Ogunde and Kuyinu have as an intention in these spectacles “to clarify the popular beliefs, by organizing them (in refined way has)” (oral testimony of G.B. Kuyinu collected by Ebun Clark for its thesis in 1974), bound for the Yoruba public as with the Westerners who would come to have an image of the Africa by this spectacle. In the Sixties, Duro Lapido will include this defense of the African traditions while imposing a program on European (to lower curtain and hello at the end of the spectacles).

The Black Forest is the last spectacle created with Kuyinu, obliged by its family to give up the scene and to resume its work of civil servant with Warri. Strike and Hunger is thus the first opera produced by Ogunde alone. It is inspired directly by a strike by at the end of June 1945 which lasted 44 days. It made fold the colonial capacity which has to revise its economic policy. This strike had a great repercussion in the British Empire, a strike of support took place in Jamaica.

From beyond the sea, Yejide came to supplant the local king. It exploits the population, starves it and asks him to repurchase at exorbitant prices its own productions that all will have beforehand had to deposit with the palate. Then the people decide to stop plowing and force the king to increase the wages. Strike and Hunger is one of the first parts car financed by the receipts of exploitation.

A professional troop

The Ogunde December 14th, 1945 makes publish an advertisement: “the Party of Search for African Music seeks 30 charming young girls to employ them as remunerated actresses”. It does not receive any answer so much the concept of actor renvoit always to the beggars, with the alarinjo. By renewing the advertisement this time for the search for ladies clerk (employed religious offices), it can start to form its professional troop.

In 1946, it creates Tiger' S Empire , Darkness and Light , Mr. Devil' S Money (Ayindé), Herbert Macaulay . Tiger' S Empire is a new attack of the colonial capacity (the white men came so “asserting the grounds to become fatty”, Mr. Devil' S Money was described by Major Anthony Syer in Daily Service like a production of which the high-quality of organization (of an impeccable order) " the standard high off discipline" fact of thinking of a production of a theater of London, precision of the rate/rhythm of the drums and beats of hands substitute largely to the symphonic music.

Herbert Macaulay is a historical part recalling the life of the dead father of independence Nigerian in May 1946. This part is played on July 8th, 1946 and on August 13rd at the end of the first round (one week) of the troop with Ilaro, Abeokuta, Ibadan, Ibeju-Ode, Ososa and Shagamu. Human Parasites follows (Parasitic human), which is one of the first comedy of African manners. She makes fun of excesses of an Yoruba practice (Aso Ebi) which wants that with a marriage or a burial the maximum of women get dressed like the bride or the widow.

At the end of September, Ogunde starts one second round where it undergoes its first prohibition with Jos for the part Strike and Hunger . It is shown to want “To educate the northerners with the policies of Lagos”.

The British Empire indeed maintains a kind of inculture in north, by limiting the schools and the information means to it, by reinforcing the traditional models of lesson (family and religious), etc

The Party of Search for African Music is actively supported by the nationalist press, the church and the public what enables him to face the pressures of the colonial capacity (which remain perhaps limited because of the Yoruba language which is inaccessible to the majority of Europeans), and which makes viable its project economically. This party asserts a popular theater, Christian and close to the nationalist and anti-colonial intellectual mediums but which keeps this spirit of research, strongly musical, didactic while being more and more the theater of a free author, satyric and protestor.

Ogunde takes part in a broader movement of glorification of the African culture, with Layeni, Adunni Oluwole (first woman director, who will warn against the corruption of the future African leaders), and Kola Ogunmola. In 1954, it closes its theatrical group to form Commoners' Liberal Party in favor of the workmen and in 1956 and rejects the call to independence (it dies the following year of the Tétanos).

Training abroad

The July 3rd 1947, Ogunde takes the plane for London with Clementina Ugunbule (the first woman of Ogunde known in the years '60 as Mama Eko) in a concern of learning the various techniques from theater. This departure is the result of an effort made since 1945 when it had called upon donation to make it possible to the members of the Party of research in African music to obtain purses of formation to the cinematographic and theatrical techniques in the United States so:

" to study and make research in arts of the music and the African dance, by improving them;
" to return in contact with the civilized countries of the world to give us access to very a technical high level in our dramatic art in West Africa
" to establish public theaters in the important cities of West Africa, where the way of living and the capacities of African would be interpreted of way adequate by the entertainments, the operas, the Cinéma and the musical productions.

" That so that the West Africa acquires its right place in the concert of the nations (the Commonwealth off Nations) ".

In 1947, Ogunde thus obtains thanks to the pressure of the independence press and its personal insistence a visa in the intention to study in Guidhall School off Music and Drama, and with the School Exchange off Speech and Drama in London. But retained too a long time with Lagos under pretext which it depicts the Africans in a too positive way and which its parts do not have of the independence accents, it cannot any more but leave to visit the principal theaters of London, which it will manage only partially to do. However it returns to Lagos with 2000 pounds of theatrical equipment. Its voyage in addition enabled him to meet Bobby Benson, which will become a time its rival and who will influence his theater. It hopes as of its return to introduce the clappers and the waltz into the dances Batakoto and Epa. In its new part Towards Liberty (1947) he announces himself in favor of independence, he changes the name of his Party by that of Ogunde Theater Party (the party of theater of Ogunde), reinforcing the personal aspect of his work. In 1948, it creates Yours Forever , and undertakes a round with the Ghana which proves to be catastrophic.

Theater and music

It then creates a spectacle which starts a new turning in the history of its theater: in order to conquer the Ghanaian public, it creates a programme of varieties with saxophones and trumpets: Swing the Jazz (1947), and sets out again in round with the Ghana where it gains a sharp success. By this compromise, Ogunde what is called associates its work with the “Concert Party”, show musical of jazz variety and comic improvisations which becomes very popular in the Fifties in West Africa. The precursors of this style are Ishmael Johnson (Bob Johnson), Charles B. Hutton and J.B. Ansah which founded in 1930 the company “The Two Bobs”. They take as a starting point the culture of the schools of the British Empire, of the English popular songs (Lawrence Wright' Album), of the one man show of Teacher Yalley (very popular in Ghana of the Twenties), and of films of Charlie Chaplin. They thus invent the style in the theater-concert which songs Miss and dances in local language (Fante), with grotesque make-up and costumes (with Chaplin, and Al-Jolson).

Swing the Jazz approaches this style, without its aspect grotesque, and sung in English. The history told in the spectacle is a sex case, the friends of a groom seeking to ruin his marriage by jealousy and scandalmongering, in the form of a light moral lesson. Ogunde takes again melodies of jazz American like “London Calypso”, or “Chattanooga Choo choo”. This evolution towards a light form and easy remainder initially within the framework of this round except Yoruba country, but in Lagos, starting from 1948, Benson' S Modern Theatrical Troupe involves the Yoruba public with the taste of the varieties, of the African variety. Ogunde is competed with by this new form theater and ripe of its Ghanaian experiment, it transforms its artistic proposal, incorporates instruments of jazz and is tested with the impromptu dialogs. Bread year Bullet (1950), by telling the massacre of workmen in strike by the colonial police force, gives to this style a political dimension. Princess Jaja (1953), resolutely directs Ogunde towards the shape of impromptu theater.

Highway Eagle alternates impromptu scenes (whose Ogunde writes only the screen) and songs Yoruba. The topic is that of the life and the judgment of a popular brigand. It makes resumptions of its old productions in the new style, incorporating for example in The Devil' S Money of the airs of Boogie Woogie! After the independence of the Nigeria acquired in 1960, Ogunde will transform its theater again. It adopts the titles in Yoruba, and founds an original contemporary theater and an independent dramaturgy. Noting the division of the “Group Action”, majority party in the Western area, it writes a song for the unit of the party, and present in 1965 Yoruba Ronu (Yoruba thinks) in which it gives up the entertainments Jazz is. It starts from a political fact of the 19th century, a treason which weakens the unit of the Yoruba people vis-a-vis the Northerners. The spectacle is presented to the inauguration of Egbe Omo Olofin to Ibadan in front of the regional authorities. However its representative, the Akintola Chief recognizes himself in the character of the traitor, leaves the room, and will prohibit all representations in the area of the troop of Ogunde. Its group is declared illegal and “dangerous for the good government of the Western area”. Ogunde answers this banishment by the spectacle Otito Koro (1964) (the Truth is Meilleure) with an opening in favor of whole freedom of expression (we promised with God to say the truth even if it is sour… You became like Rhino/which goes only in the dark night, etc). Follow Awo Mimo , Aropin you enia .

Political evolutions

The first military coup d'etat of the January 15th 1966, gives again the right to Ogunde to make turn its spectacles in the Western area. To take part in the expo' 67 of Montreal, Ogunde founds the Company of Dance Ogunde (1966), which will propose two spectacles of dance: Oh Ogunde! (London - 1969) and Nigeria (Glover Hall - 1977) Ogunde creates thereafter Ire Olokun (1968), Mama Eko (1968), Oba' nta (1969), Ewe Nla (1970), Iwa Gbemi (1970), Ayanmo (1970), Onimoto (1971), K' ehin Sokun (1971), Aiye (1972).

Ogunde allows direct addresses the public, started again by female choruses. The impromptu comic sketches succeed of the songs and the dances. The personalities of Ogunde and Madam (Mama Eko) are increasingly central and their presence is the occasion of quasi a worship. Its theater reaches nevertheless a certain maturity, if not a certain classicism: the writing is built, Onimoto is thus cut out in 4 acts of which the first contains 4 long scenes, the second act 7 scenes long, the third in to 4, and the last contains 2 of them. One can bring closer the intrigue to this part of a study of a fact various, while taking into account that a fact various with Lagos often contains a magic history, gods and Sortilèges which make that apparent realism is found unceasingly rocked in a universe strange and surprising. Ogunde does not draw aside either from its work the freedom of tone and of form of the beginnings, the dialogs succeed the songs, the choruses remain present throughout the spectacles, and humor, derision and social criticism preserve these spectacles of very facilitated. Of 1974 with 1977, the productions of Ogunde are Ekun Oniwogbe (1974), Ewo Gbeja (1975), Muritala Mohammed (1976), Oree Niwon (1976), Igba you O die (1977), Orisa it (1977) with the National Theater with Lagos.

Assessment

Hubert Ogunde is obviously an inventor, with Kuyinu it accompanied its first creations by a research task original and productive. It is while drawing from the cultural content living of its area that it knew to captivate a public to become and impose an original style about it. This step was that of the European ethnologists, it is that of an artist here. First of all Ogunde organizes these habits and these songs by crossing them with the Christian heritage and the form of the European opera, at the same moment when the ethnologists reinforce the “wild” roots of the traditions autochtones. It is to forget that West Africa they is also Empires and cities, and that if there are as many villages as it there in Europe, that prevented forever the blossoming of major arts centres like Ife, Oyo and recently Lagos. Ogunde is conscious that a new public is being born in the capital from a Nigeria which will be a long time the most dynamic nation by its richness and the number of its population in West Africa. In fact, with independence, everything led us to believe that Lagos would be the most influential metropolis of the area, well in front of Dakar or Abidjan.

While taking part in the blossoming of a new independent nation, Ogunde remained the guaranteeing one of a Art original, independent and popular. How this energy does not have you it been able to save the Nigeria catastrophe which awaited it? How all that was built and invented by Ogunde and those which followed it, Layeni, Adenni Oluwole, Kola Ogunmola, Duro Lapido, Moses Olaiya, how all that, this force and this vitality of the theatrical creation of West Africa has as well as possible you it reduced to a theater of export, at worst of financial misery. Because according to testimonys of the directors, Nigerians of today, put aside the international success of Wole Soyinka, the original creation of West Africa is in a serious situation. According to Wole Oguntoku, the places of creations which were the prestige of the culture of the new African nations like Glover Hall, the National Theater or the Theater of the University of Lagos are in a catastrophic state or in the process of commercial Privatization.

Iconography (masks egundun)

http://www.authenticafrica.com/olyoregmas.html
http://www.egbaegbado.org/egba14.htm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/1567074.stm
http://www.douglasyaney.com/y2872-2main.htm
http://www.dailytimesofnigeria.com/SundayTimes/2003/JULY/20/Thegovernment.asp

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