91st birthday of Theophilus Enwezor Nzegwu

(Born 3 July 1928, Onicha, Biafra)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

DISTINGUISHED electrical engineer, academic, air force pilot, okee nwoke mmadu

electrical engineer: plays key role in expanded electrification programme in Igwe Ocha, Biafra’s Oshimili Delta, and elsewhere in Biafra, and Nigeria, in the early 1950s on return from the United States where he had studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

academic: particularly meritorious career at both Kumasi College of Technology School of Engineering (now Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology), Ghana, 1955-1958, and Royal Air Force Halton School of Technical Training, England, where he is flying instructor, 1959-1964

air force pilot: Royal Air Force – commissioned flying officer, July 1959 and becomes flight lieutenant, 1962; pioneer air force pilot major and commander, Nigeria air force, September 1964

(Red Garland Quintet, “All mornin’ long” [personnel: Garland, piano; Donald Bryd, trumpet; John Coltrane, tenor saxophone; George Joyner, bass; Art Taylor, drums;  recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, NJ, US, 15 November 1957]) 

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe’s recently published books on the Igbo genocide are The longest genocide – since 29 May 1966 (2019) and co-author, with Lakeson Okwuonicha, of Why #DonaldTrump is #great for #Africa (2018)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

107th birthday of Léon-Gontram Damas

(Born 28 March 1912, Cayenne, French-occupied Guiana, east of Suriname, S America)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

POET, editor, philosopher, academic, co-founder, with Léopold Sédar Senghor and Aimé Césaire, of the 1930s-1940s “negritude” intellectual movement of African-peoples affirmation in Paris, France, and whose demonstrable volume of poetry, Pigments (1937), gives notice of the engaging trajectory of the movement:

… my hatred thrived on the margins of culture

the margin of theories the margin of idle talk

with which they stuffed me since birth

even though all in me aspired to be [African]

while they ransacked my Africa

(Andrew Hill Sextet, “Spectrum” [personnel: Hill, piano; Kenny Dorham, trumpet; Eric Dolphy, alto saxophone, bass clarinet, flute; Joe Henderson, tenor saxophone;  Richard Davis, bass; Tony Williams, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 21 March 1964])

*****Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is the author of The longest genocide – since 29 May 1966 (2019) and co-author,

with Lakeson Okwuonicha, of Why #DonaldTrump is #great for #Africa (2018)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

77th birthday of Ama Ata Aidoo

(Born 23 March 1942, Saltpond, Ghana)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe 

DISTINGUISHED poet, playwright, novelist, academic

(Alice Coltrane Trio, “Oceanic beloved” [personnel: Coltrane, harp;  Jimmy Garrison, bass; Rashied Ali, drums; recorded: Coltrane home studio, Dix Hills, New York, US, 6 June 1968]) 

*****Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is the author of African Literature in Defence of History: An essay on Chinua Achebe (2001) and Readings from Reading: Essays on African History, Genocide, Literature (2011)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

82nd birthday of Michael Echeruo

(Born 14 March 1937, Umunumo, Biafra)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

POET, literary critic, academic, university vice chancellor (president/rector),  offers selfless and distinguished service as head of the Biafra resistance government’s communication directorate during phases I-III of the Igbo genocide, 29 May 1966-12 January 1970, foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa, carried out by Fulani islamist/jihadist-led Nigeria and its suzerain state Britain who murder 3.1 million Igbo people or 25 per cent of this nation’s population; in phase-IV of the genocide, 13 January 1970-present day, the dual genocidists have murdered an additional tally of tens of thousands of Igbo people – including the 3000 murdered by the Muhammadu Buhari regime and its adjunct Fulani militia since November 2015, following Buhari’s imposition in power in March 2015 by ex-US President Barack Obama and ex-British Prime Minister David Cameron

(Booker Little Sextet, “We speak” [personnel: Little, trumpet; Julian Priester, trombone; Eric Dolphy, alto saxophone; Don Friedman, piano; Art Davis, bass; Max Roach, drums; recorded: Nola’s Penthouse Studios, New York, US, 17 March 1961])

*****Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is author of the recently published The longest genocide – since 29 May 1966 (2019)  (https://re-thinkingafrica.blogspot.com/2019/01/published-longest-genocide-since-29-may.html)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

84th birthday of Kofi Awoonor

(Born 13 March 1935, Wheta, Ghana)

POET, linguist, academic, diplomat

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

90th birthday of Theophilus Enwezor Nzegwu

(Born 3 July 1928, Onicha, Biafra)

DISTINGUISHED electrical engineer, academic and air force pilot, okee nwoke mmadu – electrical engineer: plays key role in expanded electrification programme in Igwe Ocha in Biafra’s Oshimili Delta and elsewhere in Biafra, and Nigeria, in the early 1950s on return from the United States where he had studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; academic: particularly meritorious career at both Kumasi College of Technology School of Engineering (now Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology), Ghana (1955-1958) and RAF Halton School of Technical Training, England, where he is flying instructor (1959-1964); air force pilot: Royal Air Force (commissioned flying officer, July 1959; becomes flight lieutenant, 1962), pioneer air force pilot major and commander, Nigeria air force, September 1964

(John Coltrane Quartet, “Acknowledgement” {part-I of A Love Supreme suite} [personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone; McCoy Tyner, piano; Jimmy Garrison, bass; Elvin Jones,  drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 9 December 1964])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

73rd birthday of Anthony Braxton

(Born 4 June 1945, Chicago, US)

ONE of the most prolific composers of his generation with music stretching in multiform genres that he collectively captions “creative music”, multiinstrumentalist, philosopher, academic, chess player

(Dave Holland Quartet, “Conference of the birds” [personnel: Holland, bass; Rivers, reeds, flute; Braxton, reeds, flute; Barry Altschul, percussion, marimba; recorded: {as above}])

(Max Roach & Anthony Braxton, “Birth” [personnel: Roach, drums; Braxton, reeds; recorded: Ricordi Studios, Milan, Italy, 7 September 1978])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

114th birthday of Charles R Drew

(Born 3 June 1904, Washington, DC, US)

PHYSICIAN, academic, distinguished researcher in medical sciences, directing, soon after his doctorate degree in Columbia University Medical School in 1940 (first African American, had earlier on in 1933 received his MD and Master of Surgery degrees at McGill University), the special New York-based blood transfusion service for Britain, set up in response to the acute blood supply shortages in the country, for both civilian and military, during these early months of the Second World War, named after the Charles R Drew University of Medicine and Science, California

(Billy Strayhorn Quintet, “Upper Manhattan Medical Group” [personnel: Strayhorn, piano; Clark Terry, trumpet; Bob Wilbur, clarinet, soprano saxophone; Wendell Marshall, bass; Dave Bailey, drums; recorded: ?, 1965]) 

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

81st birthday of Archie Shepp

(Born 24 May 1937, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, US)

Tenor saxophonist, composer, bandleader, unrelenting freedom exponent, academic

(Archie Shepp Sextet, “Syeeda’s song flute” [personnel: Shepp, tenor saxophone; Alan Shorter, fluegelhorn; Roswell Rudd, trombone; John Tchicai, alto saxophone; Reggie Workman, bass; Charles Moffett, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 10 August 1964])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

83rd birthday of Cecil McBee

(Born 19 May 1935, Tulsa, Oklahoma, US)

EMINENTLY influential bassist, composer, academic

(McCoy Tyner Quartet, “Bluesin’ for John C” [composer: McCoy Tyner] [personnel: Tyner, piano; Pharoah Sanders, tenor saxophone; Cecil McBee, bass; Roy Haynes, drums; recorded: Impulse! Records, New York, US, 9 July 1987])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

81st birthday of Ron Carter

(Born 4 May 1937, Ferndale, Michigan, US)

BASSIST, cellist, composer, bandleader, academic, arguably the most recorded jazz bassist and member of Miles Davis Second Great Quintet, 1963-1968 *****(Davis, trumpet; Wayne Shorter, tenor saxophone; Herbie Hancock, piano; Carter, bass; Tony Williams, drums)

(Miles Davis Quintet plays Ron Carter’s composition, “RJ” [personnel: Davis, trumpet; Shorter, tenor saxophone; Hancock, piano; Carter, bass; Williams, drums; recorded: Columbia Studios, Hollywood, Los Angeles, US, 20 January 1965])

*****Miles Davis First Great Quintet (1955-1958, full personnel: Davis, trumpet; John Coltrane, tenor saxophone; Red Garland, piano; Paul Chambers, bass; Philly Joe Jones, drums)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

87th birthday of Chukwuemeka Ike

(Born 28 April 1931, Ndikelionwu, Biafra)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

NOVELIST, university registrar, academic, Africa west region principal pre-university qualifying examination board (WAEC) administrator, one of the leading intellectuals in defence of the people during the Igbo genocide, phases I-III, 29 May 1966-12 January 1970, carried out by Britain and its Nigeria client state led by Hausa-Fulani/islamist jihadists during which 3.1 million Igbo or 25 per cent of Igbo population are murdered in this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa; Anglo-Nigeria launches phase-IV of the genocide on 13 January 1970 and this has continued unabated with tens of thousands of additional Igbo murdered; Igbo genocide is the longest, most gruesome, and most ruthless genocide in contemporary history

(The New York Contemporary Five, “Trio” [personnel: Archie Shepp, tenor saxophone; Cherry, pocket trumpet; John Tchicai, alto saxophone; Don Moore, bass; JC Moses, drums; recorded: live, Jazzhus Montmarte, Copenhagen, Denmark, 15 November 1963])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

106th birthday of Léon-Gontram Damas

(B 28Mar1912, Cayenne, French-occupied Guiana, S America)

POET, editor, philosopher, academic, co-founder with Léopold Sédar Senghor and Aimé Césaire of the 1930s-1940s “negritude” intellectual movement of African affirmation in Paris, France, and whose demonstrable volume of poetry, Pigments (1937), gives notice of the engaging trajectory of the movement:

… my hatred thrived on the margins of culture

the margin of theories the margin of idle talk

with which they stuffed me since birth

even though all in me aspired to be [African]

while they ransacked my Africa

(Andrew Hill Sextet, “Spectrum” [personnel: Hill, piano; Kenny Dorham, trumpet; Eric Dolphy, alto saxophone, bass clarinet, flute; Joe Henderson, tenor saxophone;  Richard Davis, bass; Tony Williams, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 21 March 1964])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

89th birthday of Cecil Taylor

(Born 25 March 1929, New York, US)

VIRTUOSO pianist and one of the preeminent leaders of the free-jazz movement beginning in the mid-1950s, prolific composer, poet, academic

(TWO masters’ rare and perhaps only known recording session together: John Coltrane and Cecil Taylor play Coltrane Time, featuring the following four compositions: “Shifting down”, “Just friends”, “Like someone in love”, “Double clutching” [full personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone; Kenny Dorham, trumpet; Taylor, piano; Chuck Israels, bass; Louis Hayes, drums; recorded: United Artists Records, New York, US, 13 October 1958])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

76th birthday of Ama Ata Aidoo

(Born 23 March 1942, Saltpond, Ghana)

 Distinguished poet, novelist, playwright, academic

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

81st birthday of Michael Echeruo

(Born 14 March 1937, Umunumo, Biafra)

POET, literary critic, academic, university president (vice-chancellor/rector),  offers selfless and distinguished service as head of the crucial Biafran resistance government communication directorate during phases I-III of the Igbo genocide, 29 May 1966-12 January 1970, foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa, carried out by Nigeria and its suzerain state Britain who murder 3.1 million Igbo people or 25 per cent of this nation’s population; in phase-IV of the genocide, 13 January 1970-present day, the dual genocidists have murdered an additional tally of tens of thousands of Igbo people

(Charles Mingus Sextet – with Eric Dolphy, Cornell University 1964, “Meditations” [personnel: Mingus, bass; Johnny Coles, trumpet; Dolphy, flute, bass clarinet; Clifford Jordan, tenor saxophone; Jaki Byard, piano; Dannie Richmond, drums; recorded: live, Cornell University, 18 March 1964]) 

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe

83rd birthday of Kofi Awoonor

(Born 13 March 1935, Wheta, Ghana)

Poet, linguist, academic, diplomat

 

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe

80th birthday of Ishmael Reed

(Born 22 February 1938, Chattanooga, Tenn, US)

PROLIFIC poet, essayist, novelist, pianist, composer, academic

(John Coltrane Quartet, “My favorite things” [personnel: Coltrane, soprano saxophone; McCoy Tyner, piano; Jimmy Garrison, bass; Elvin Jones, drums; recorded: live, Comblain-la-Tour, Hamoir, Belgium, RTBF radio & television network, 1 August 1965])

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe

103rd birthday of Arthur Lewis

(Born 23 January 2015, Castries, St Lucia)

ERUDITE AND WIDELY PUBLISHED economist, academic, economic advisor to Ghana’s Kwame Nkrumah government (1957-1959), awarded the Nobel Prize for economics in 1979, university administrator, Caribbean regional bank president; Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies, SALISES, Cave Hill, Barbados named in his honour

(Arthur Lewis Building, University of Manchester {houses School of Social Sciences and School of Environment, Education and Development}, named after Professor Lewis who taught economics at Manchester from 1947 to 1957)

(John Coltrane Sextet, “Blue train” [personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone; Lee Morgan, trumpet; Curtis Fuller, trombone;  Kenny Drew, piano; Paul Chambers, bass; Philly Joe Jones, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, NJ, US, 15 September 1957])

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe

94th birthday of Max Roach

(Born 10 January 1924, Newland, North Carolina, US)

Drummer, one of the influential innovators of the be-bop jazz revolution of the 1940s-1950s with fellow-drummer Kenny Clarke and lead proponents Charlie Parker (alto saxophone), Dizzy Gillespie (trumpet), Thelonious Monk (piano) and Bud Powell (piano) and later Charles Mingus (bass) and Miles Davis (trumpet), influential band leader, composer, academic

(Max Roach Sextet, “Freedom day” [personnel: Roach, drums; Abbey Lincoln, vocals; Booker Little, trumpet; Julian Priester, trombone; Walter Benton, tenor saxophone; James Schenk, bass; recorded: Nola Penthouse Sound Studio, New York, US, 31 August/6 September 1960)

 Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe