Music must awaken people to do their duty as citizens and act.
Fela KutiRead
Without Tony Allen, there would have been no Afrobeat.
Interpretation
Tony Allen was crucial to the creation of the Afrobeat genre.
This quote by Fela Kuti highlights the profound impact that Tony Allen had on the Afrobeat music genre. As the drummer and musical director for Kuti, Allen's innovative rhythms and techniques were foundational in blending traditional African music with jazz and funk to create a distinctive sound that characterizes Afrobeat.
In practice
In a documentary about Afrobeat music, this quote can emphasize the importance of collaboration in musical innovation.
Music must awaken people to do their duty as citizens and act.
The rhythm, the sounds, the tonality, the chord sequences, the individual effect of each instrument and each section of the band - I'm talking about a whole continent in my music.
I'm playing deep African music.
The art, the greatness of the music, the experience of the music is what I'm about. I think most African artists have destroyed their artistry by commercialization, and I don't want to belong to that bag.
The human spirit is stronger than any government or institution.
My message was 'Think African. Make schools read African history.'
It wasn't until I hung out with Dead Prez and understood how to make, you know, raps with a message sound cool that I was able to just write "All Falls Down" in 15 minutes.
It was very interesting in my world, because I grew up as a fan and I did not know that there was a thing called R&B, pop, country, classical - I just knew that I loved music.
Rap will never be the same as before
Walter Beasley is an anomaly: a successful performing musician who possesses the rare skill of understanding the musical process beyond the intuitive. This special ability enables Walter to communicate with aspiring musicians in a way that removes the sense of mystery that sometimes enshrouds our profession.
Jazz is a good barometer of freedom.
It used to be called boogie-woogie, it used to be called blues, used to be called rhythm and blues...It's called rock now.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.