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Culture Café Berths In Anthony Village

By Uchechi Okafor
11 October 2015   |   1:19 am
DOCTORS, lawyers, bankers and their likes go to work every day; then why can’t entertainers do the same? This is the motive behind the opening of Culture Cafe, a place for art, passion, and lifestyle. We have enough musicians, poets, writers and creative minds in Lagos and Nigeria at large that need platforms to express themselves. We have, therefore, made a move to provide that through the opening of the café”

shaddieDOCTORS, lawyers, bankers and their likes go to work every day; then why can’t entertainers do the same? This is the motive behind the opening of Culture Cafe, a place for art, passion, and lifestyle. We have enough musicians, poets, writers and creative minds in Lagos and Nigeria at large that need platforms to express themselves. We have, therefore, made a move to provide that through the opening of the café”

This was how the co-founder of Culture Café, Mr. Ayoola Shadare of Inspiro Production, introduced their new offering at its opening last Sunday at Prince of Anthony Hotel, Anthony Village, Lagos. The launch in which Lagos’ night came alive featured live band performances, spoken words, and acoustic musical renditions from the likes of Onyeka Nwelue, Bright Gain, Justin Ige, Seun Kesh, Spectacle Band, Grace Okpo, Akin Adenuyi and a host of others.

While throwing more light on the motive behind the launch of Culture Café, Shadare, added, “I think when artistes perform often they get better at what they do and when they cannot get the big stage we need to provide smaller stages. All the great acts we hear and read about started in places like the culture café where artist were given a platform to perform daily, weekly and monthly. That, however, is the reason we have put in much effort to start up something like this in order to aid artistic performances and ability”.

The launch had plenty of jazz and highlife music, merry making and dancing. The audience expressed delight at the wonderful initiative. Author of The Abyssinian Boy Nwelue expressed excitement, as he said, “Jazz music is the father of all music. All kinds of music, when retraced, points back to jazz music; even spoken word came from jazz music. Therefore, the kind of music and creative art the cafe is promoting is very good and is something I would love to be a part of”.

Highlife crooner Stella Monye added, “I think it is a welcome development because the live band culture is gradually dying in Nigeria and when you want to feel the real music, it is from the live band and I think the café would go a long way to add spice to the entertainment life of Lagos”.

While expressing gratitude to the owner of Prince of Anthony Hotel 1960, Shadare and his Culture Café partner Mr. Jide Adefune commended Mr. Akin Adenuye for sharing the vision of the café and providing them space to actualize that dream. Adenuye also indicated his full support for the project, as he said.
“There are three things I know I was brought to this world to do which are to read, write and partake in a great creative enterprise that includes literature, drama, music and the arts in general. I am an art director and I support creative processes; so when this opportunity came up there was no possibility of me not being a part of it”.

“There would be live band, writers and poets from all over the country performing four times a week from Wednesday to Saturday but the café would be open for business throughout the week”, Shadare said.

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