OLD GOSPEL MUSIC IN NIGERIA
By Margaret Udeme
Gospel Songs are kind of motivational Christian music that has become a major part of Nigerian music. In the 1960s, the evangelical church of west Africa choir was popular and in the early 1970s, Bola Aare, Ebenezer Obey, Onyeka Onwenu , among others were notable. The act of singing gospel songs is a practice that was brought into Nigeria about late 15th century by Portuguese catholic who had arrived Benin city at this time for missionary work. These songs were mostly rendered then during church worship service. They took the form of monophonic liturgy like the Gregorian Chant- these are songs without polyphony and not written (rendered in parts) but having only one line of melody.
By mid-19th century, missionary activities (which had diminished earlier) had revived in Nigeria, this time around it was championed by church missionary society which is owned and funded by the church of England ( Anglican Communion). At this time, the activities of CMS centered mostly around south-west Nigeria.
The CMS introduced different genre of Church music that involved congregational singing of hymns led by a choir. Incidentally (and not surprising), the first known Nigerian to have recorded gospel songs was a product of the Anglican Communion’s CMS. He is late Reverend Josiah Jesse Ransome-kuti.
