I listened to St Janet just as I listened to Fela’s Na Poi. I have always loved creativity in all its forms, just as I cherish freedom. My instinct is to let people create, speak, sing and imagine as they wish, provided they do no harm to others. I have always been an admirer of the free spirit. Civilisation advances not merely through conformity but through those willing to push boundaries.
St Janet’s passing has provoked intense debate. The moralists never accepted her. Many religious people could not stand her. Yet she commanded an enormous following among ordinary people, while many who publicly claimed refined tastes quietly listened to and enjoyed her music in private.
That contradiction is as old as society itself.
Had she been a conventional musician, she might have lived and died unnoticed in some obscure corner of Agege. Instead, by refusing to conform, she compelled society to confront questions of taste, morality, class and artistic freedom. Whether one admired or disliked her, she became impossible to ignore. I would not be surprised if, in years to come, scholars write dissertations on her music, her language, her audience and what she represented in the evolution of Nigerian popular culture.
