When life was a little better than it is now, young people would learn how to sing touching song from the classroom hen begin to form cluster of musical groups. This was how we lived in the early 90s as school children. The popular Literary Week, where schools are prepared to take part on speech contests, usually inter-school debate, Poem recitation ( I vividly remember reciting David Diop's poem: A Plea For Mercy), Spelling Drill, News Casting and then Miming, which is the height of all the events. The competition was healthy and champions from all the regions all looked forward to it. Today, I would like to reminisce about one group that emerged from some of the musical groups back in school.
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Cosmos Tega, a self-acclaimed rapper started a group with Michael Ebo, Edu Zubair (Tupac), and Big Tree. This was after they mime Boyz II Men: Water Runs Dry and took the best presentation at CMS Grammar School Literary Week. All representatives of our school hailed away as they danced on stage in their black and white costumes. I won't forget how those girls began to lurk after them like real stars. This competition was held on Thursday and went through the evening that we returned home from the venue. The next day, which was Friday, we were elated to be in school to continue the rendezvous of the symphony.
The news was already around town that Wordgate College won the miming trophy. So, proudly, our principal mounted the podium of the assembly ground to announce.
Good morning boys and girls.
Students responded:
Good morning sir.
Alright! Some of our good ambassadors represented this great citadel of learning at the just concluded Literary Week of CMS Grammar School and made us all proud.
Then it began to call out the positions, we brought back in the different categories as the entire school applauded us.
Debate: 1st position
Spelling Drill: 2nd position
Poem Recitation: 1st position
News Casting: 3rd Position
Brain Teaser: 1st position
Miming competition: 1st position
As soon as the principal mentioned the miming, the whole assembly ground went agog with whistling, clapping, and whatnot. The assembly that day was fun as we were glad to have represented the school in a good light.
Now the biggest task is to keep a track record of the same result we got from CMS Grammar School. Then, Cosmos asked that we formed a new group. All six guys came from different departments of the school, two from the sciences, the other two from the arts, and the last two from the commercial department. So, we meet in the school sports complex every Wednesday afternoon that is set aside for co-curricular activities.
After about two meetings, we agreed to name the group Lagos Symphony. We had a duty of sea thing for new songs from quality musicians like Joe, Bob Marley, A-Z Yet, Bobby Benson, Soul 4 Real, Celine Dion, West Life, Tupac Amaru Shakur, B.I.G, Eminem, Mariah Carey, Elton John, Mario, and even local Nigerian acts like Baba Fryo, Style Plus, Dginee, etc. We were also to write our songs which was the funny part about the whole thing. One of such songs written by the duo of Cosmos and me:
¶ My mama Nah Christian,
The woman I'm living with,
She beating me too much,
Then I park my load,
And moved away.
This was all in the song, nothing more but we held it in high esteem. The chorus was song blabbing that cannot be written in words 🤣😂🤣. You know what? We still went ahead to sing this song each time we went out. And we were known for this. Each time I remember this, I giggle with a big smile or a fat laugh seeing how we reasoned while we were growing up.
During those days, final year students are restricted from some of those outings because the school authorities were keen on ensuring they are fully prepared for their final exams.
When it came to our time as final year students, Lagos Symphony suffered a great blow because we rarely meet. Of course, there wasn't enough time to meet as usual.
Music was a passion for some of us. I was just a back-up singer, not that I really wanted to do music, the only thing that got me grafted to music was because all my friends were into it. All the interest that had been built up disappeared when we reached our finals.
Ebo Michael and Big Tee still went ahead to build a huge career in music.
Can you school days ever be like mine? Let's here it in the comment box.
Great ! I was also privileged to represent my school in different quiz competitions during my college days, within the State and interstate competitions.