Department
Odeion School of Music
Office
Odeion School Of Music 218
Joseph Kunnuji is a senior lecturer in Ethnomusicology and African Musics at the Odeion School of Music, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa. His research interests include reimagining marginal and historical musical practices. He combines teaching, performing and academic activism in unearthing his musical heritage and making it more widely known within the academe and broader society. With a background in a few West African musical practices, an orthodox church Western hymn-singing tradition, and prolonged participation on the Cape Town music scene, Kunnuji embodies the intersection of many musical worlds, and as such, he is well positioned for studies and performances foregrounding interculturality. He is currently the Chair of the Board of Directors of the African Researchers Network CIC (a UK-based research association with members from different parts of the world). Kunnuji is an associate editor for the Journal of the Musical Arts in Africa (JMAA) and serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Artistic Research (JAR).
Kunnuji, Joseph. (2024). Gbokos: A history of cosmopolitan ambiguities involving omolúàbí, artistic development and the economics of brass band music in Lagos, Nigeria (1970s – 2000s). Muziki, 21(2), 5-26.
Kunnuji, Joseph. (2024). Performing Affects: Precarity, Liminality, Belonging and the Strategies of a Migrant Bandleader Within a South African Music Scene. Popular Music and Society, 48(1), 25-40.
Kunnuji, Joseph. (2024). Gbenopo in Ogu Musical Culture: An Ethnography of Social Capital in Badagry. In Ubuntu: A Comparative Study of an African Concept of Justice, edited by Paul Nnodim and Austin Okigbo, 119-138. Leuven: Leuven University Press.
Kunnuji, Joseph. (2023). Gangbe in Badagry, Nigeria: Ogu Women’s Performance Practice, Social Status and Creative Agency. Yearbook for Traditional Music, 55(2), 171-191.
Kunnuji, Joseph and Wium, Matildie. (2023). Interrogating the Nuances of West African Melodies: Cadential Conventions in Ogu Songs. Journal of the Musical Arts in Africa, 20(1), 37-54.
Bruinders, Sylvia and Kunnuji, Joseph. (2022). Banding together in Cape Town and Lagos: Engaging Reciprocity as Applied Ethnomusicology. Yearbook for Traditional Music, 54(1), 27-47.
Coates, Adrian and Kunnuji, Joseph. (2022). Towards a contextual Theology of Conviviality: Tutu, Bonhoeffer and Living Musical Metaphors. Acta Theologica, 42(2), 68-85.
Kunnuji, Joseph. (2022). The National Troupe of Nigeria Post-Ogunde: A Cultural Diplomacy Fad or Farce? In Re-centering Cultural Performance and Orange Economy in Post-colonial Africa: Policy, Soft Power and Sustainability, edited by Taiwo Afolabi, Olusola Ogunnubi and Shadrack Ukuma, 209-227. Singapore: Springer Nature.
Kunnuji, Joseph. (2022). Gospel Music Cosmopolitanism in Lagos, Nigeria, and the Soft Power Potential of its Iconic Practitioners. In Religion and Global Politics: Soft Power in Nigeria and Beyond, edited by Olusola Ogunnubi and Sheriff Folarin, 257-274. Lanham, Boulder, New York and London: Lexington Books.
Kunnuji, Joseph. (2022). Reinterpretation and Re-contextualisation of Badagry`s Ogu Music in Avale: Ethnomusicological and Artistic Convergence in a Trans-local and Trans-genre Collaborative Music Production. A peer-reviewed proceeding of the Performing, Engaging, Knowing Conference of the International Council for Traditional Music (ICTM) Study Group on Applied Ethnomusicology, from 26-29 August 2020.
Kunnuji, Joseph. (2020). Musical Responses from Lockdown: Adaptations in Foregrounding Remote Performances in Lagos, Nigeria. Journal of the Musical Arts in Africa, 17(1), 141-144.
Kunnuji, Joseph. (2017). Guided Syncretism: Repackaging Badagry Ogu Music in the Context of Lagos` Post-colonial Modernity. African Music: Journal of the International Library of African Music, 10(3), 79-94.
Kunnuji, Joseph. (2014). Review of Tony Allen: An Autobiography of the Master Drummer of Afrobeat by Michael Veal and Tony Allen Published in 2013 by Duke University Press. Journal of the Musical Art in Africa, 11(1), 113-115.
Convivial Scholarship project - Unearthing the values and virtures of Yoruba Alo (chantefables): A Sequel to Gerhard Kubik`s 1960 and 1963 Fieldwork in Oshogbo, Southwest Nigeria.
Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) project - An Evaluation Project on the Design and Best Implementation Practice for Ethnomusicology Specialisation Modules at the Odeion School of Music, University of the Free State.
Music and identity in Africa
Ethnic minorities in African and their marginal musical practices
Current relevance of indigenous African music, knowledge and skills
Current trends in the development of popular and digitally assisted African musical genres\
The decolonial discourse
Ethnomusicology and African musics in the 4th industrial revolution (4IR)
MUMB4808 - Selected Topics in Ethnomusicology and Popular African Musics
MUMB3704 - Introduction to Ethnomusicology and indigenous African musical practices
MUSM3722 - The World Music Phenomenon
MUSS3722 - Theory of Jazz
2025–till date: Editorial Board Member, Journal of Artistic Research (JAR).
2025 Principal Adjudicator, African Music Section, National Institute of Allied Arts Zimbabwe (NIAA) 2025 Vocal and Instrumental Eisteddfod.
2023 Co-Director, Bloemfontein Life Change Centre (BLCC) Music School (an outreach program at The Heidedal township, Bloemfontein, established and sponsored by the Odeion School of Music, University of the Free State)
2023–till date: Associate Editor, Journal of the Musical Arts in Africa (JMAA), published by NISC (Pty) Ltd in association with the South African College of Music at the University of Cape Town.