Orlando Owoh: A decade after

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THE canary is a small songbird that was used in the coal mining industry to detect carbon monoxide, though this practice was stopped in the UK in 1986. The expected lifespan of the canary is 10 to 15 years and like the most successful national football side of all times, the Brazilian national football team adopted the nickname Canarinho (meaning the Little Canary).

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Likewise arguably, the greatest cerebral cultural activist from this part of the world – Dr. Stephen Oladipupo Olaore Owomoyela trading as Dr. Orlando Owoh who passed on a decade (the canary expected lifespan) ago on Tuesday November 4, 2008 started his band as Omimah band in recognition of his Ifon roots before adopting the name Young Kenneries, that later transformed to the African Kenneries International.

In all honesty, I cannot vividly recount how I got enticed to the Orlando brand just as ants are attracted to sugar, but I remembered growing up in an environment where Dr. Orlando was highly regarded and held in high esteem by those who neither drank nor smoked, contrary to beliefs in certain quarters that the partakers formed the larger chunk of his fan base – one of the torch bearers of the Kennery revolution, his sibling Tosin Owomoyela of the Zion Kennery band neither smokes nor drinks.

But I do know that the Osogbo born of Ifon/Owo parentage, Dr. Orlando Owoh who entered the planet on Sunday, February 14, 1932 was a man of many parts, who was involved in Carpentry (being the family trade), part of the famous Osogbo drama school with the Kola Ogunmola Theatre Group, a fearless boxer (at least he tutored King Sunny Ade in the sweet science), he joined the Nigerian Army, where he teasingly referred to himself as ‘Private Moridele’ in reference to his exiting the Army and returning home unscathed.

Dr. Orlando Owoh was our canary in a coal mine who was never shy to detect the presence of the toxic societal carbon monoxide, always speaking the truth to the powers that be, even in the era of brutal military dictatorship, he launched that timeless album ‘I Say No’ where he chastised military rule(rs) and called for an immediate return to civil rule, only men with guts and grits dared such in those unforgettable dark period in our chequered national history (though I have my doubt if he would have been happy at the actions and inactions of the protagonists of this demonstration of craze – apologies to Fela Kuti, his close ally with whom he shared so many similarities not restricted to musical dexterity, socio cultural activism, Pan Africanism and the unhypocritical love for Ganja/Weed – now partially or wholly legalized in Canada, US, Belgium, Australia, the Netherlands, Germany Spain and South Africa.

The philosophical native intelligence in the arrangement of his oral folklores delivery is mythical. With over 45 albums and numerous live jams, the pure artistic and entertainment value was never a scarce commodity, that is the legal tender of the Kennery exponent – Adajo Ere, Mawo mi roro cannot be underestimated, and trust Baba Orlando, language was never an issue as he rose to the occasion as the tongues demanded to crush the barrier not known in music.