When most Nigerians think of the Grammy Awards, we think of Femi Kuti's four nominations and King Sunny Ade's two. Sometimes we go as far as claiming the four won by Sade Adu and Seal respectively as ours. But we do have a bonafide winner, a Nigerian who has won the Grammy Award not once, but twice. His name is Lekan Babalola, a 56-year-old jazz musician and percussionist.
His first Grammy came in 2006 for his work on the album In the heart of the moon by legendary Malian guitarist, Ali Farka Toure. And Babalola got his second Grammy Award in 2009 for being on Cassandra Wilson‘s album Loverly.
Growing up in Lagos, Nigeria as a choirmaster’s son, he started his foray into music by playing cowbells and drums in the church. By the age of six, he formed a ragtag band with his peers. ‘All we were playing were tins and plastic – and I would be imitating my father. That was my first band and I paid my fellow musicians- my friends- with sweets that I bought with the money my mother gave me,’ he said in a documentary.
Even though music came to him easily and he quickly developed a knack for leading a band, he had a different dream- he wanted to be a pilot so at the age of 20, he got a scholarship to study automobile engineering at Chelsea College of Automobile and Aeronautical Engineering, London. But like his idol Fela Kuti had done some twenty years before, he soon found that his calling was not aviation but music.
Story courtesy The NET NG
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