Lekan Babalola Tours UK Cities With Yoruba Sonnets – Features Dr. Olu Taiwo

Acclaimed Grammy Awards-winning percussionist, Lekan Babalola is bringing his music to a wider audience alongside his co-travelling Sacred Funk Sextet in a new concert series tagged Yoruba Sonnets.

The multi-city gig will take place across major United Kingdom cities featuring Babalola’s kindred spirit, the accomplished spoken word poet and scholar, Dr Olu.Taiwo. Their artistic chemistry on stage will pick up from the successful Ebo Tour which held last year.

Together, Lekan who is releasing a new album soon and Olu will bring to the stage the Yoruba Sonnets – a unique experience, presented by two very talented, very different individuals. The Yoruba Sonnets pair spoken word poetry and mime from Dr Olu Taiwo with live music from Lekan Babalola’s Sacred Funk Sextet. The result is a unique performance of ancient Nigerian verse incorporating Afro-beat music and the contemporary sound of Western Funk.

Yoruba Sonnets will serve its first instalment in full doze on Saturday, July 28 at the Birchfield Jazz Festival, St Mary’s Church Hamstead and continues on Saturday, October 13 at The Performance Gym, University of Winchester, Hampshire. The music train continues at Cheese and Grain, Frome on Sunday, October 21 while curtains fall at Charney Manor, Wantage.

Twice Grammy award winning Nigerian percussionist, Lekan Babalola, is well known for his innovative musical style, using his native Yoruba tongue infused with traditional music, Afrobeat and funky dance overtones.

In addition to being a talented musician, Lekan has also undertaken education work as part of his artistic programme and has on-going relationships both in the UK, USA, Europe, Caribbean and Africa as a percussionist, art curator tutor, band leader / composer and producer.

Dr Olu Taiwo is Senior Lecturer in Performing Arts at the University of Winchester. He has worked on identity and performance and is a well-established performer using digital technologies. He is engaged with critical debates around the interaction of body, technology and the environment.

To find out more about Lekan and Dr Olu Taiwo, visit:

Facebook – Olalekan Babalola

Twitter – @LekanBabalola / @drtaiwo

Websites – www.lekanbabalola.com

YouTube –

Yoruba Sonnets: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9cKkbL5L9aY

Sacred Funk Quartet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tkSZm_z1Vs

Below are the confirmed dates and venues

Venues and Dates

Saturday July 28^th

Birchfield Jazz Festival, St Mary’s Church Hamstead Road,

Birmingham B20 2RW.