Intercultural Creativity in Joshua Uzoigwe's Music

Abstract

This essay presents Joshua Uzoigwe as a Nigerian intercultural composer. A short biography of the composer shows the influence of two cultur—Nigerian (Igbo/Yoruba) and European—on his creative outputs. Uzoigwe's experience in the two cultures has enabled him to compose music which is indisputably a synthesis of Nigerian and European musical idioms. His works are classified into five categories, while the creative style exhibits purely original compositions and works in which Nigerian musical elements are directly utilised. A discussion of Uzoigwe's music includes elements of tonal organisation, elements of dance, elements of musical conception and instrumentation. The issue of bi-culturalism, national identity and the search for a Nigerian audience are some of the problems Uzoigwe attempts to solve in his compositions.

Bibliographic and Discographic Inquiries in Music Composition

“…It is worth noting that the musical themes and resources must reflect from the emerged data collected and analyzed. The intention for combination of Pan-African and Western instruments to satisfy intercultural music as described by Sadoh (2004) must be shown clearly in the design. That must be carefully chosen to reflect tone compatibility, pitch implications and their availability for the performance of the novelty to be created.…”