INTERVIEW WITH OLANREWAJU OF RIVERS SONGS

 

Muyiwa and River songs springs again like fresh  river water, Takes Over hmvapollo London with River Bands.

Classical American- Nigerian gospel artiste Muyiwa Adebayo Olanrewaju famously known with his gospel  band River songs. Muyiwa and river songs have over the years been reckon with as a gospel music blend with  unique traditional flavour that drive home the messages and sensational thrill  fill songs  that does not only  entertain their lovers and loyal fans but also accord them  to praises  and worships that are unlimited.   The river songs band leader Muyiwa  cum  flag bearer of the band in an Exclusive timeout  share the experiences that gave birth to River Songs and their ‘all around the world concert’ that will be hitting  hmvapollo  in London live.

  

Have been trying to get you for years now

Lanre: he’s been trying to get me but doesn’t contact me, he’s too business with D Banj, Don jazzy and many of them .

 Now lets get to do things Muyiwa and the river songs how would you explain it to people?

Lanre: Well for a lot of people who doesn’t know the river songs, we are just a collective gurus, i can’t really say we are a group because each person in rivers songs like  me Muyiwa Adebayo  olarewaju  and the river songs comprises of artistes  with their own right  musicians and sensationalism , we  have people like Femi  Temoore, Femi is  easily one of the top  three guitarist in his country, his last album  “evening stand” was Jazz stand out of the mount,  we’ve got people like Steven wonder  too all sorts in the group.  When we all come together  we became the  river songs. So river songs is a collective of professional musicians but as i will say fate brought us all together.

River songs how did you guys  came up with the name, because when one  first heard river songs one will surely be like, where did that come from ?

 Lanre: The name came from the bit of the bible which explain the experiences  of a prophet who was in a river and the water  arouse to his ankle, his kneels and he’s able to swim so for us  when we started river songs we try to like , the idea was that we create music that will create experience  because music is something that start in the spirit gently and before you know it you start swimming in it and it all started in 2003  a friend of mine Eddy martins who work in the name of Quincy Jones you see him work with the like of Jennifer Lopez, Chris brown and the likes. We grew up together we studied music together , we went to the same church  and we are like we want to give our gift praise  to the lord so we call our friends together , we have the drummer who works with a big band,  the guitarist who works  with  the west life, the keyboard who works with kally marnow, we just call everyone together  recorded an album and push out that’s how everything started.

You are mentioning name like Jennifer Lopez, Chris brown  and co, have went through your works and see people you’ve worked for , produced with we have Chris brown and likes, this names kept coming and I said to myself . this is mainstream and haven’t actually find out that you’ve worked on music for a while which could mean that you have aspiration of doing popular music but why change the plans?

Lanre: i didn’t really decided that  i was actually on the struggling, i  was in the church and i was the church music  leader i love God and still do   and i just want to do pop music that’s my thing but it doesn’t work. One main reason it doesn’t work when you tell it to people who understand Jesus, when my mother, my mother have two children two girls but my mother wanted to have a male but my dad was done so my mother didn’t tell my dad that she’s stop taking protection  then she’s praying then she sees a vision where a hand  is giving her a boy, she close to grab the boy and the hand move back and tell her that she has to give him back the forgiving tools and she was like yeah! She get the boy,  conceived and i arrived  and so she remembers and the interesting was that the journey started when i was in my court, we have the ‘ iso mo loroko’ ( do you  just say that)lol! When they were about giving me my name every one gets in,  friends the neighbour  young and old  God knows i have a whole and then my mother she could not just bare it so she ran outside and then the voice came again . the one she heard when she was getting the boy telling her that all this name you are about to give to this child is not his because he His mine, He his OLUWAMUYIWA, which means it is the lord that brought him so she went to my dad told him that this is just what i just heard and my dad. My dad was a Muslim, Kareem( Kayode Olanrewaju)  and he became a Christian through my mum, and generally  if one became a Christian through that he became serious about everything  and when my mum told him he was like is that what you heard, then that’s what we are going to do and he was like you am sorry your name is out so that how i got the name and when i spell it its like pretty long.

Yes talking about the name the way you call  and carry the name , when BET first started  transmitting or Broadcasting  here as they call it , one of the first couple of things they were showing  was you. Your face  was all over  on BET for some couple of month talking about yourself and what you do, Is there a particular thing about the name because the way you call each letters and syllable   of the name, is their a feeling you get from calling the name ?

 Lanre: Yes  their is, you know their is a story , a whole story behind it with that few seconds of mentioning my name because part of my journey is associated with  it because the primary school i went to  that time a banana  will be  leave on my table and i will be call a monkey, their was sometimes i wanted to change my name to Steven or Jeffery and i think like when I go to church how am I going to tell my uncles they will just  like bull me and tell me to find a place to sit. But there was one day i woke up and i was like things are not like how we see it in the media, like the lie that things in  Africa or  Nigeria is  bad, i was like God didn’t make a mistake to made me Olanrewaju  and when I woke up more to myself   my thought was like i will be Muyiwa Olarewaju Adebayo Jide Okunola if you don’t like it cal me Jeff and if you don’t like it just move out of the country and what was intrigue for me is the fact that it’s a generation of young people who are like i don’t mind being because apparently till then even now what you would here when people say Nigeria is like Oh! Nigeria that folks. I go to some places and some people would told me you are not like the normal Nigerian  and i ask what is it about people in Nigeria is it that they have two heads or what, so it part of my quest to represent as it were am going for the opportunity, my  hope is  I never mess up the brand  Nigeria.

You are probably one of the hard working guy in the business and not going to say music business alone because you wear many hat, you are a producer, a writer, a radio and TV personality , you are specialist you have people that work for you, you work for yourself also work for people, Is this your first Album?

       Lanre: yes ( this is your first studio album since 2002 so basically  in the space of ten years you’ve done five studio album and you’ve also done a lot of work for people ) now tell me how do you motivate yourself  to doing all this things?

Lanre: Motivation comes  from within  and motivation  for me. first thing is understanding  the reason of my being and the reason of my being if greater than i am, and when you know or realize that what you are doing is not for  you and secondly things is been in your base because i do lot but it does not seems like i do even i  feel like i do more only if  i had enough  administrative support so i don’t feel like Oh! My Goodness the weight of the work is too much ,the truth of  the matter is sometimes   when my life is  and sometimes am travelling God knows  and  i just don’t know where am going  i just stop asking questions and go to the airport have my ticket then travel and  things happen when am  going or coming because all this speck volume of the person one have to do with. The question about motivation, one is that  it’s all about  understanding the reason for your being so also  understanding or finding yourself in the place you ought to be and  have been terrible fortunate for me to fell into music , fell into radio fell into Tv and am just like  if the falling is Ok  then i think i  keep falling so for me motivation comes all around.

Now been  a performer  you had the opportunity  to perform at  churches, big massive places and getting people doing  Muyiwa and the river songs  just  like you said, i was listening to some of  your songs  and doing something else i just had my ear piece listening to another music and i think it was just like as you said it , i just find it that  all of a sudden one leg stars moving faster  and the body i got into the grove and  i was like let me see you performing at a concert which i saw  and you know you even said it may be it was at a church you said to them if they are not dancing then there are not a Christian and from that instance people started jumping up, dancing and singing along with you. The concert is one among the sold  out concert in the  prestigious indigo concert among concerts in the world now, this is your fifth album you stepping it up again