By Esther Faroye
COME weekend, Lagos-based journalist and performance poet, Akeem Lasisi, will play the role of lead performer/chanter and producer of WONDERLAND(eleleture)an album of musical poetry, in the public presentation of the album at the 1960 Hotel, Eagles Park, Ikeja, Lagos.

Wonderland which is Akeem’s third album, coming after POST MORTEM (1999) and ORI AGBE (2004), will involve the expertise of several talented artistes and culture promoters that include Ropo Ewenla and Edaoto Agbetuyi.

It is a six-track album that celebrates poetry, love, culture, heroes such as Prof. Niyi Osundare and the late Chief Bola Ige, while also taking a cursory look at some social dilemmas in the country.

The Tracks: Eleleture (Not a Small World – love); Wonderland (about contradictions in the Nigerian project); Asabi Alakara (a satire celebrating a street-wise lady that survives nasty instincts of lecherous men); Pareke (Correct Pricing); Omo a Bo (for Niyi Osundare); and Erin Karele (for Bola Ige).

The album is produced as part of Lasisi’s contribution to the development of African arts and literature. The six-track album, particularly seeks to recreate the oral performance culture, which is under the threat of ‘modernisation’, despite  the fact that oral poetry is a custodian of the people’s history, politics and socio-cultural heritage.