By Dayo Showemimo
The 18th edition of the annual MUSON festival is fast approaching and as part of efforts to make this year’s edition spectacular, the management of MUSON have announced Tunde Jegede as the new Artistic Director of the facility.
The 10-day MUSON Festival 2014 will hold between October 16 and 26, 2014 right inside the premises of the society located at Onikan, Lagos.
The new artistic director, Tunde Jegede, was born 1972 to a Nigerian father and an Irish mother. He had his education at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama and Purcell School of Music and his appreciation of African Diasporic culture was initiated and nurtured at the famous Keskidee Centre, Britain’s first Black Arts Centre.
A composer, multi-instrumentalist and musician par excellence, Jegede takes over from Mr. Thomas Kanitz, a German, noted for his exemplary service while at the Centre.
With over 30 years experience, Tunde Jegede’s music has been performed all over the world in concert halls such as Carnegie Hall, New York, the Royal Albert Hall, London and the Basilque Paris by international orchestras and artists including The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, The Philharmonia, London Sinfonietta, Brodsky Quartet, Smith Quartet and the percussion soloist, Evelyn Glennie.
He has written three full-scale operas, twenty symphonic works and worked with over a hundred orchestras and chamber groups. Tunde has recorded four solo albums including his seminal debut album, ‘Lamentation’ and ‘Still Moment’ a meditative album of solo Kora. His new solo kora and solo cello albums, ‘Heritage’ and ‘Testimony’ were both released in 2014.
