Nigeria is the home of twerking, says an avid Fela fan who goes by the name Mallam Okwechime Abdul on Facebook. He runs the Facebook group, Kalakuta Chronicles and hosts a show on the online radio, iGroove Radio.

Abdul contends that twerking was made popular by Fela and his dancers.

He wrote in a post on the page: “In Africa, dancing is revered. Music and dancing are integral part of the African culture. Whenever Africans celebrate or are marking any event, music and dancing are interwoven into such.
Children learn how to dance at very early ages in life. They usually learn by joining age groups dancing troupes or watching older members of the family do the unique cultural dances of their ancestors and lineage.

“Interestingly the females are always the focus and indeed the main thrust of the dances in Africa. Across Africa scintillating wriggling of the waist is the hallmark of dances. The style of waist wriggling varies from people to people. But what is common is the reliance on women to package the dances.

“The rest of the world usually waits for International Culture Festivals to witness the Africa dance displays. These also go for people of African descent; Brazilians, Jamaicans, Caribbeans….

Queen Sewa, one of Fela’s best twerkers
However the emergence of Fela on the world music scene took African dancing to a different level.

“Fela repackaged the dances of Africa for international consumption. He redefined waist wriggling and made global audience salivate and drool for more each time his dancers mounted the stage. He started this very early in his career. And he evolved the now worldwide Afrobeat Dance.

“Dele Salami, the beautiful dancer was the pioneer Afrobeat dancer. She was a lone dancer but creditable she defined the steps of future Afrobeat dances. Her dance and subsequently Afrobeat dance, is centered around the waist. Size of butt0ckz of the dancers goes a long way to enhance the dance but it is the dexterity in the art of wriggling the waist that leaves the audience gasping. Now the whole world is in a trance.

“Initially with Dele alone, it was just a matter of freestyle waist wriggling dance. But with the emergence of the Kalakuta Republic and the famous Fela girls who later became Fela queens, more dancers were introduced. The freestyle waist wriggling style, largely dependent on the dexterity of the individual dancer, began to mix with the choreographed dance pattern yet largely centered around patterned waist dance.
What this means is that a dance teacher came to add these patterns to whatever waist wriggling talents the dancer had. And this instructor, (wait for it) was most of the time Fela himself.

“Fela supervised and taught dances at rehearsals, patterned along the Afrobeat Rhythms in his head. So the choreographed dance steps on Fela stage were indeed patterns formed and created by him out of the beats of his music. He knew what he wanted to see as he put it succinctly, “African Woman Go Dance, She Go Dance Fire Dance….” It was indeed the burning fire of Africa Dances that emerged on the Fela stages.

“The fear in those days was continuity after Fela might have passed on. But unconsciously, while growing up, his two daughters, Yeni and Sola, were usually very attentive observers at these rehearsals. And this is aside the fact that Dele Salami, the pioneer dancer had also deliberately gave them the appetite for Afrobeat dance.

“So when Fela left the scene the two sisters took up the Afrobeat dance. And today years after Fela created the dance, and Sola, his younger of the two first daughters, had also passed on, Yeni Kuti who actually felt and shared her father’s dream has kept the flame of Afrobeat dance burning. Today the whole world is doing Afrobeat dance.

“And all of a sudden from the creative impetus of one man who saw tomorrow, twerking, (waist wriggling dance) has taken the centre stage globally.”

Watch one of Fela’s stage performances below where the dancers wound their waist in a way akin to the contemporary hip hop dance called twerk or twerking. Dance can be seen from 9:50.


Do you agree?