FELA ANIKULAPO KUTI ( FOUNDER OF AFROBEAT)

 FELA ANIKULAPO KUTI

His music and outspokenenness made Fela a hero to Africa's poor, but he would pay a high price for his insurrectionary micro-republic, which was repeatedly raided, and he and his followers would be arrested and beaten. In early 1977, the military junta had had enough – Fela's record Zombie, mocking the army's do-as-you're-told mentality, may have been the tipping point for head of state General Obasanjo, who had once been in the same primary school class as Fela. A thousand soldiers overwhelmed Kalakuta, brutalising and raping as they went, then razing the compound to the ground. Fela was beaten close to death, and his elderly mother thrown from an upstairs window, afterwards dying of her injuries.

Fela defiantly established a short-lived political party and continued to spar with the authorities. "ITT (International Thief Thief)", for example, deplored the exploitation of Africa by multinationals. Increasingly, he carried his music and message to an international audience, though the west's media acclaim was never matched by record sales or stadium concerts. Tours that entailed a 50-strong entourage and albums of 20-minute songs didn't help. Nor did his imprisonment for two years on trumped-up currency charges on the eve of a 1984 world tour. Later still, Fela became a student of the spirit, only leaving home to play twice a week at the Shrine.

At his death from an Aids-related illness at the age of 58 in 1997 Fela left behind seven children, 50-odd albums and a musical legacy that has been kept fiercely alive by his sons Femi and Seun, and by his erstwhile drummer Tony Allen, who last month celebrated his 70th birthday with an all-star concert in London. Belatedly, Afrobeat has become a cause célèbre among young European and American music fans.

Yet the most surprising aspect of Fela's afterlife arrived two years back when the biographical musical Fela! became the unexpected toast first of off-Broadway and then Broadway itself, garnering rave reviews and a string of awards. Never able to conquer the United States while alive, Fela Kuti had finally been taken to its cultural heart, captivating a new generation of black luminaries such as Jay-Z (one of the show's co-producers) and Alicia Keys.