Fela's Musicians - Interview with Rilwan "Showboy" Fagbemi, Part 6

Showboy...almost 40 years around Fela

Ron: The tragedy of Fela's death is that nobody ever got beyond that music. 

Showboy: He created that pattern. No one, no one has yet, because, him in Nigeria, he was like the father of Nigerian musicians, most of the musicians in Nigeria were feeding from what he does. If Fela release an album today, all other musicians will release two, three albums from picking one phrases from Fela's music and use it, maybe the percussion aspect of the music, maybe the whole line, maybe the guitar, they will use it, and before you know, they've got their own. 

Ron: How did you get so good on the sax that when Fela heard you, he said "That's it!"?

Showboy: Well, I've always been a member of the Africa 70, always been with him as an acrobat, I've always been around him when he was writing those music. So I'm part of it, part of the creation, part of the development, so I grow up in this shape, almost 40 years around Fela, since I was a kid, so this is what I know how to do best, Afrobeat, that's all. 

Ron: That's enough.

Showboy: Yeah (laughs) 

Ron: I came to see Femi the other night, you don't see music like this where I come from, four hours straight through.

Showboy: In our time, when Fela was alive, I start playing about 11:00 in the night, Fela come about 12:30 -1:00, and we play 'til 6:00 AM non-stop. 

Ron: And everyone stays too, the crowd.

Some of the crowd stays 'til 7:00 AM. We are used to playing for 4 - 5 - 6 hours. We can play straight for 5 hours non-stop. 

Ron: You go to New York now, you're going to pay 50 bucks and hear a 45-minute set.

Showboy: We had that problem at the Apollo, listen, listen, we are having two shows at the Apollo, so the first show was supposed to end at 8 o'clock. Fela started the last track, and the last track is about 25 minutes, and if we have to play everything with all the solos, 3 solos or 4 solos, because you have the trumpet solo, you have the baritone solo, you have the tenor solo, and you have the guitar solo, if all the solos have to go on it is more than 35 minutes, you understand? So the promoter now came and tell Fela you cannot play for more than 10 minutes, and Fela said "I cannot cut my music because of you, I will play my music til the end." And he never stopped 'til we got to the end. So by the time we finished playing we exceed about 5 or 7 minutes. We paid for it. 

Ron: When you soloed with Fela, did he just let you solo what you feel, or did you have a certain time?

Showboy: You see, we the solo players on Fela's stage, we are known, even the audience they know us, at this time we are expecting Ronnie, at this time we are expecting Showboy. The know that at the Shrine there are particular people who are doing the groove. Like me, I sing, I play, I lead the band until Fela comes. So I do most of the songs, most of the records, because Fela has this, what do you call it, it's like his, he has never played any recorded song, you cannot ask him to play any record he has released, so he is always playing something new. That is why he will not accept you coming on Monday playing sha-ba-de-ba-de-ba, coming on Tuesday playing sha-ba-de-ba-de-ba, he will say , "What's wrong with you? Leave that place, man." 

Ron: What I'm asking is say one night you feel like playing 3 minutes, the next night you feel like playing 10 minutes, he let you?

Showboy: Yes, yes, look, you see, this is it, when you are on the path, music is about your expression, if what you are giving is good, everybody wants to listen to good music, good solos, because there are times you come in with anger, that is why your mood tells your expression. 

Ron: I play good when I'm angry.

Showboy: (laughs) You see, so sometimes you are happy, you come there, you play, you freak out, and sometimes you have one problem your mind is busy fighting, you just get there...BAH.  BAH.  BAP. What's happening to him? And before you know, you are out of there. What's wrong with this man? But when you are on course, when your mood is OK, when you are happy and you are doing good he will let you finish your solo, he will let you satisfy yourself, play everything, because one, when you start your solos, you have people who gonna back you up. So when they back you up and they stop, that's all. After they stop, you have to play for maybe 8 bar, maybe 16 bar, maybe 24 bar, then you cut off. That's it.

Fela's Musicians - Interview with Rilwan "Showboy" Fagbemi, Part 2

Rilwan "Showboy" Fagbemi

Showboy: I'll tell you what I was doing. You know when before I became an instrumentalist, Ronnie, I was an acrobat. I was a stage dancer.

So, as I was saying, one day, I asked myself that why don't I play something like a musical instrument? Because I was around when Fela started playing the saxophone; he taught himself a lot of things about the saxophone. Because Fela was a trumpet player, you understand. He picked up the saxophone, I think in '74. You understand? He pick up the saxophone around '73-'74. 

Ron: He studied music, right? 

Showboy: Yes, yes, at the Trinity College of Music in London. He came back, he was writing his music, he had broken it, made it easy for everybody, because one, you need to be able to read, you need to be able to understand the reading, and you have to have this (points to his head), you've got to be fast thinking because when Fela is writing he never waits for no one, the moment he wants this, out of four, two are getting it two are not getting it, he will ask the two who are not getting it to just shut the fuck up and listen to the two who have got it and learn from what they are doing. So by the time he finishes that rehearsal the next time you come...rehearsal is about perfection, about you know trying to complete what you are doing. 

Ron: That is what rehearsal is all about, there is no musician in the word who nails it the first time every time. 

Showboy: No, no, you have to go through it. And you see, I wish you saw one of the rehearsals of Fela himself. You know why? When Fela is on stage rehearsing man that stage is ON FIRE! The concentration of everybody because you know he is like a conductor, like a choirmaster. When we are rehearsing he's facing us, he is backing the audience, and people are free, people are free to come and watch the rehearsals. Then he starts. When he is writing the new music, he starts this way: he invites the rhythm to the house. The guitar with the conga. To keep the guitarist on tempo, the conga is taking the job of the metronome, to maintain the rhythm, to give the guitarist the idea and the speed of the music he is about to write. 

Now, when he starts, he practice with the guitarists, at home. When the guitarists are OK, he now brings them to the Shrine and now calls for general practice. That's when he starts infusing the whole line. 

Ron: (discussing the triumvirate of James Brown, Miles Davis, and Fela) 

Showboy rehearses Egypt 80 at the New Africa Shrine

Showboy: You got it right because I remember when we had this benefit for James Brown release at the Apollo Theater, we did two concerts in one night and the two concerts were sold out. I was on front page of the New York Times on June 24, 1990. They described my saxophone like a bull elephant, the way I sound. Yeah, I was bad, I was a bad, hot baritone saxophonist. 

So, now, after that show, you know in 1986 we had a Humanity Festival in Paris, we played with Miles Davis, he was there live, before his death. The last show was the Apollo Theater concert, it never happened, an African band direct from Africa stormin' New York. 

Ron: So how did you do? 

Showboy: Oh shit, it was BAAAD. I played at the (name unclear) on 53rd, at the Madison Square Garden, I played at the Apollo Theater... 

Ron: This [the New Africa Shrine] is the Carnegie Hall of Africa.