Wasiu Ayinde Omogbolan Anifowose Marshal (aka K1) is a Nigerian Fuji musician, the Mayegun of Yorubaland, the Olori Omo Oba of Ijebuland and a farmer. In this interview with Guardian Newspaper at his Mayegun Resort, Ijebu-Ode, Ogun State, he speaks on sundry issues, including his family, band, Mayegun Resort, politics and Nigeria.
Congratulations on staying relevant and doing music for 52 years. Do you have plans to establish a music school?
There is no way I will establish a music school that would be able to convince people more than the resilience they would need to pursue life properly. Young people of today want to do one thing and strike millions. They want to perform once and the next day go out to buy a car.
I don’t know how to do magic; I don’t have a magic wand to do that. So, to open a school is a good thing but instead of bothering myself by the opening of a music school, this resort and my studios are enough for people to come here.
Are you open to collaborating with young artistes?
I have had the opportunity to collaborate with many artistes in the past. At the stage I am now, for someone to have put in over 50 years, I should be a role model that many others will read like a book and get something good out of it, which is more than collaborations. My kind of music and present-day music is different but I can tell you that the formative part of present-day music takes its cue and its learning from what we have done in past years to suit the modern life of today.
My concern is I want to be talked about as an artiste who has come along the line and I also want to be studied as an artiste and how I have been able to manage to go far. My concern is for every artiste to know that it’s more than just playing music and going back to sleep because those who played it in the past but did not develop the business angle of it ended up just as entertainers or just as one-time musicians simply because of the way they handled it. I make use of every opportunity that comes my way. If I meet a new person today, what I want to hear from him or her is an opinion or overview; from there I will see a way to ask questions to know their ideas and what they can contribute.
At this age, I should be thinking of resting more, but I found out that my energy is still very high. I am fine health-wise. I do not have any major ailment I am nursing. I am close to 70 but I am fine simply because I don’t over weigh myself with stress. I’m a farmer too and sometimes I go to the farm.
How are you preserving your legacy and how are you ensuring that artistes in the future use your template?
Olamide remixed my song Anifowose; Anifowose is my song and I used it, and when Olamide was to use it, I didn’t object to it; he was a young man that was coming up. Artistes from every part of the world come here to pick from what we have and they never give credit to anybody; they take it away and turn it around. Now our children listen to them every day.
So, if I don’t give them the opportunity he won’t be doing well as he’s doing today. It is part of what we are leaving and also part of what we gain from people before us. My genre of music is still being appreciated and still fetches me money.
Do you have children who are into music?
I have children who are doing well in music; I have both male and female. My children lay their hands on different kinds of music; Fuji is their background, what they know their father for; but they exhibit the ones they find themselves doing. My daughter, Honey is doing well in England, and my son, Musty. They have been featured in many musical expositions.
How many hours do you invest into research daily?
All my life I have done research; presently, I am in school. I will soon be a fresher in Olabisi Onabanjo University (OOU) to study music. I am trying to do things in my own.
Your former drummer, Ayankule made some allegations. What’s your side of the story?
Our band is like an organisation that hires and fires. It’s an organisation where if you signify intention to join, you are taken on board, and by tomorrow if you find something else, you can opt-out.
When I established my band, it was my sole idea to do so, and I called other people to partake in it. You must have the qualities of a leader to do anything like that. What is so difficult to manage is the coming together of people.
When I see that my ways are not yours, I can easily drop you. If it aligns and you want to opt-out, I would advise you not to do so. So, that’s how I formed my band.
A majority of them run away on our trips abroad. I have a majority of them who are not genuinely in love with music. They only showcase what they feel they have a talent for, and we tolerate them with the approach of ‘with time they will grow.’ But they have their plans.
They will threaten you by saying they will run away. Mine isn’t the first time. A whole band had travelled with Shina Peters, my friend, and they eloped.
The sharing formula for income between the band and I was initially set at a ratio of 60:40. Over time, with the increase in band members, it was adjusted to 40:60, with both sides donating 10 per cent of earnings to pay management staff.
Aside from payments made to performing members on tour, there is a culture of paying members who were not able to go on tours overseas.
In my band, there is an order that those who died in active service get paid. Their families still go to collect whatever money we give to them. If we travel abroad, those who didn’t come with us get paid even if they are in Nigeria.
Ayankunle, who is complaining that they withheld his passport, ran away from the band in England while we were on tour. He ran away with two other people in the band. He took his passport along. That was in the 90s. My band members are well-to-do.
Why did you decide to build Mayegun Resort?
Mayegun Resort is my private resort that also serves as my museum and my library. While I sojourn in music for over 50 years, it comes to mind that a lot of us did not plan for something that will outlive us and continually give credence to all we have laboured for.
A U.S. president wants to establish a presidential library after leaving office. At a time, we copied that in Nigeria but not all the ex-presidents in Nigeria has a presidential library. I thought of doing something to immortalise myself, something generations after will see after I must have gone.
I started the project and we are on the first phase; I have a studio where I stream live. This resort goes beyond a place to have fun; we have medical facilities, we have MRI machines and others. This is open to the public but to a section of people on one side and another on the other side.
Mayegun Resort has gone beyond what I planned initially. It is getting bigger. I am not running a hotel but a resort and I want to link it to so many things I’m putting up. I have a golf court attached to this; I have a ranch and others.
How long did you have this plan?
I have been planning this for over 30 years. I planned to work and see what I could achieve. I hastened the project at a point when I had a second chance to life. After my surgery in 2010, it dawned on me that I needed to leave something for posterity, for learning opportunities and for the community to know that I am from there and a lot of responsibilities came to my shoulder that I now see reasons for it.
I was given the chieftaincy title of Oluomo of Lagos, the responsibility of Mayegun (Peacemaker) of Yorubaland and recently, the Olori Omo Oba of Ijebuland. I see all the callings as an opportunity to be able to give back to the larger society. I have put in professionally 52 years as a stage performing artiste, minus the time I started Ajiwere Ajisare when I was eight years old; I turned pro when I was 15 and between 15 and now, I have put in 52 years and that is worth thanking God for. Now, I am mature enough to understand what I am putting back and the reason I am doing so.
For instance, when you visit Elvis Presley’s birthplace, you will see what caught the attention of tourists and people across the world. So, this place is going to be a thing like that, a place where this community will thank God for. I hope that others will learn from this that one must strive very hard to leave something behind for people to see.
If anyone wants to know something about K1, he should take a trip to Ijebu-Ode to see the resort; the library where they will find enough information.
How much did it cost to do this?
What I wanted to establish here is something I want to go on for over 100 years if my children can realise the legacy left behind for them to manage and they choose to manage very well. Their children will also appreciate that somebody left something for them and the Yoruba as a whole will be proud of this.
In terms of naira and kobo, I might not be able to quantify it because it is a dream and not a venture; there’s a difference between an idea conceived like a dream and one that is just for business. There are a lot of things you won’t be able to do when you consider the business part of it; some money might be too much to be committed to a thing like this but if it’s a dream, you won’t mind the amount to spend to actualise your dreams.
Are you planning to contest for any elective office?
I am a member of the ruling party (APC) and a respectable member of society. But I have never sought a political office and I am not going to seek an office. I only want the best for my people and that is why I aligned with the ruling party.
What’s your advice for the government regarding the hardship in Nigeria?
I want to ask, who are the government? We are! We are the government and if we do not do things the way it should be done, we can’t get it right. Our problem has been that we want to complain today and get results a few hours later, and it’s not done like that.
I tilted to the side of the government to speak for both the people and the government. I appeal that we should take it easy on the government; we should correct ourselves first before we demand the government to make corrections.
Why did you take your women out of your book?
The title of my book was formerly My Way, My Life, My Women, My Music but I took my women out of it because of my children. They told me that as a person who goes deep on a topic, I should take it out. Oftentimes, I am being credited with something that is not even my way in terms of relationships. I am not worse as a man; there are several people not in entertainment but they are worse than entertainers. I see women every day in large numbers. I look for some while some look for me; some will try everything to get attracted to me and these days, responsibilities have cut my wings.
The community that bestowed on me the title of Oluomo has children too. I have the title of Mayegun; so, do I go out every day to do something inimical to peace? Or the community that conferred on me the title of Olori Omo Oba; all those things crippled me so that I can’t talk.
I have gotten to a stage where I don’t want to talk. My talking doesn’t change. Anybody that does not like you will not like you no matter what you say.
This place when completed will have a lot of people. I have taken my band to play in many places outside Nigeria. I took them to visit the Gianni Versace Estate, CNN Tower in the U.S., and I want to do something like that too where people will come, and I believe by the time I’m done with this place, a lot of people will benefit from it; they will see many things they have never come across before.
Peoplesmind
