Babatunde Olatunji Shapes Modern Drumming
Babatunde Olatunji is one of the world’s most famous drummers. The musician, who was born in southwestern Nigeria to the Yoruba people, was raised on traditional drumming, and in 1950, went to Morehouse College in Georgia on a scholarship from the Rotary International Foundation, and continued on to New York University, where he made spare cash by playing in a small drummers groups. Though he moved to America to pursue medicine, he fell in love with drumming instead.
Olatunji distinguished himself among jazz musicians like John Coltrane, who helped to found the Olatunji Center for african culture in New York, where Coltrane played his last performance. In 1957, he was signed onto the Columbia label. Olatunji made six albums with Columbia, debuting with Drums of Passion in 1959, which introduced many people on world music. The name of Olatunji’s band was taken from this record. Unusual even in percussive circles, Olatunji used more than twenty back up drummers on his recordings.
Olatunji continued to release music borne from a Nigerian flavor, with his recordings, The Drums of Passion: The Invocation and Drums of Passion: The Beat, although he released these under the Rykodisc label. The later album actually featured Carlos Santana, who scored a major hit in his debut release with “Jingo,” a cover of a song off of the 1959 record, Drums of Passion.
Though Olatunji released only a few records over the course of his more than forty years of active musicianship, with at least one album released after his death, he was a great influence for all types of drummers over time traditional players on bongo drums and djembe to modern players on electronic drum kits.
Olatunji has collaborated with dozens of musicians, popular in both past and present. His impact is evident in the work of Quincy Jones, Stevie Wonder, Cannonball Adderly and Mickey Hart, in a number of side projects taken on. Mickey Hart and Olatunji’s recording under the name Planet Drum won the 1991 Grammy Award for World Music. The musician was even referenced in Bob Dylan’s “I Shall Be Free,” off The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan.
Babatunde Olatunji also worked as a composer for films. Five years after signing on with Columbia, Olatunji composed the music for the 1961 play production of A Raisin in the Sun. He also did the score for the movie. In a move to save his career later on, Olatunji returned to cinema and is responsible for the music in Spike Lee’s 1986 hit, She’s Gotta Have it.
Throughout his career, beginning with his years with Columbia, Olatunji taught drum classes at a number of venues. He taught classes in African culture and music at the Olatunji Center for African Culture in New York, which he founded with the money from his performance at the New York World’s Fair in 1964. He also taught at the Esalen Institute in California and the Omega Institute in New York.
He finished recording on his last album, Healing Sessions, only about a month before his death. Babatunde Olatunji died in April 2003, as a result of complications from diabetes. He was 75 years old.
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