Hailing from Ekwulummili, Nigeria, the self-taught guitarist, composer and singer Oliver Nayoka launched his musical career playing guitar in churches throughout the Anambra State. Facing tough times, Mr. Nayoka put his musical career on hold for eight years to pursue business opportunities, but the lure of the guitar and playing music won out and got him his first gig as a singer in Warri in 2006.
Building on a style indelibly influenced by the dazzling and prolific guitarist Oliver De Coque, Mr. Nayoka delved deep into the highlife, eventually earning himself the accolade of the “Jimi Hendrix of highlife.”
Gathering like minds and musicians, Mr. Nayoka leads his band, Talented Fellows’ Band of Africa with the refrain, “Passion, practice and consistency.” The group has never looked back.
Mesmerizing audiences with his lead vocals and his mastery on the guitar, Mr. Nayoka has found that the hard work has paid off, and a musical dynasty is now on the map.
On the album “Aja Wele Wele”, released on the Palenque Records label, Mr. Nayoka and company breathe new life into classic highlife melded with Congolese rumba for fresh danceable tracks.
Discography:
Aja Wele Wele (Palenque Records, 2021)
Oka Mmadu (Palenque Records, 2022)
Club Series Chapter One (Palenque Records, 2022)
Author: TJ Nelson
TJ Nelson is a regular CD reviewer and editor at World Music Central. She is also a fiction writer. Check out her latest book, Chasing Athena’s Shadow. Set in Pineboro, North Carolina, Chasing Athena’s Shadow follows the adventures of Grace, an adult literacy teacher, as she seeks to solve a long forgotten family mystery. Her charmingly dysfunctional family is of little help in her quest. Along with her best friends, an attractive Mexican teacher and an amiable gay chef, Grace must find the one fading memory that holds the key to why Grace’s great-grandmother, Athena, shot her husband on the courthouse steps in 1931. Traversing the line between the Old South and New South, Grace will have to dig into the past to uncover Athena’s true crime.