This saxophonist’s jazz offers a call and response for Africa

Temidayo Balogun lives thousands of miles from his native country, Nigeria. But when the Boston-based artist uses his saxophone to tell a story – phrases climb and fade as his notes mimic the tonal Yoruba language – his focus is fully on home.After spending five years in the United States, where he moved for graduate school, Mr. Balogun this summer released his latest album, “Afrolution.” It is, he says, a way to connect with Africa from afar. And it’s an attempt to inspire other Africans to delve into their own histories and cultures to address the continent’s modern challenges.According to the album’s liner notes, Mr. Balogun grounds his ideas and songs from Pan-African figures and history, including Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of Ghana, who once wrote that “Africa is one continent, one people, and one nation.” It is a modern-day iteration, music scholars say, of a long tradition of African diaspora artists bringing their music to a global audience, and of using this music to raise awareness about political situations back home. Jibril TaiwoWith his music, Nigerian-born Temidayo Balogun raises awareness about political situations back home. “If we go back to the 1960s and ’70s, we had a number of African artists who were even in exile who would come to the West and continue playing their music,” says Stephanie Shonekan, a professor of ethnomusicology and dean of the College of Arts and Humanities at the University of Maryland.Today, the challenges facing the continent include a humanitarian crisis in South Sudan, a spate of kidnappings and killings in Nigeria, and conflict between rebels and government forces in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. In South Africa, anti-migrant tensions are on the rise, with mass protests and door-to-door raids targeting foreign nationals – moves that have divided Africans.“The only way I can really contribute ... as a Nigerian living in the U.S. who doesn’t really have much power to do anything in Nigeria is by making music that speaks about these issues,” Mr. Balogun says. For many West Africans, Dr. Shonekan says, music is an integral part of life – present from children’s naming ceremonies to funerals. Mr. Balogun has been making music since he was 5 years old, starting with the akuba drum, a local African instrument. Today, he also plays the saxophone, piano, flute, clarinet, and talking drum.Mr. Balogun has collaborated with several bands, including Charlie Kohlhase’s Saxophone Support Group, and regularly plays with The Makanda Project – a Boston-based jazz ensemble devoted to performing and extending the work of American composer Makanda Ken McIntyre.“There is a joy and a love and a sincerity that he brings to it, and you can feel that in his playing,” says John Kordalewski, who leads The Makanda Project. “It’s not like he isn’t playing jazz. There’s just a level of rhythmic depth and sophistication that I can kind of feel he’s bringing something else into jazz.”Abimbola Kai-Lewis, an assistant professor in the Africana studies department at Berklee College of Music in Boston, says diaspora artists can introduce African traditions to unfamiliar audiences while reinterpreting them through their own identities and contemporary styles.Mr. Balogun’s song, “ttowgfuth – Jan 17th 1961,” which stands for “To The Ones Who Gave For Us To Have,” for instance, is in honor of Patrice Lumumba, the first prime minister of the Democratic Republic of Congo, who led the country to its independence. The song, he says, is a way to remind “the young ones that the freedom that we enjoy today is at the back [sic] of so many people.” When Mr. Balogun was making his new album, he says, he explored various ideas of the Yoruba tradition along with those of other West African countries. In the fourth track, titled “Òs.ùs.ù O.wo.,” which means “a bound broom,” he draws on the Yoruba concept of unity.“In the composition process, I had a lot of percussion instruments like the gángan, which is known as the talking drum; agogo, which is known as the cowbell; [and] shekere ... and you also have the omele batá,” Mr. Balogun says.Despite the artist’s focus on African cultures and traditions, Eric Hofbauer, a jazz guitarist and composer, notes that Mr. Balogun’s music doesn’t only appeal to listeners of one music style. Within his music, Mr. Hofbauer says, is Afrobeat, blues, “Charlie Parker and bebop and [John] Coltrane and funk.”“You don’t have to ... only listen to a certain type of jazz or only listen to modern jazz or only listen to Nigerian Afropop or anything like that, to get into his music,” he says.To Mr. Balogun, the various instruments mixed with the melody of the Yoruba language and the jazz harmony symbolize people coming together. Deepen your worldviewwith Monitor Highlights.Politics with respectGet political stories with respectful analysis.There‘s a world of new ideas in everyBooks newsletter.There‘s more to life, enrich yours withCulture & Learning weekly.Follow humanity‘s discoveries withScience & Nature stories in your inbox.Gain a spiritual perspectivefrom the stories in your inbox.Want to understand the deeper impact of critical events? Learn the Monitor‘s insight.Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads. “That’s a way of showcasing the power of unity, and I wanted to really talk or explore the idea of unity both in music and also in our society,” he says. “Right now, we have so much going on between some West African countries and South Africa.”Mr. Balogun notes that, despite the current division, “We can hope for a united Africa.” ALREADY A SUBSCRIBER? 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