YORUBA MUSIC IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY: IDENTITY, AGENCY AND PERFORMANCE PRACTICE By Bode Omojola ________________________ Olaolu Lawal (Reviewer) 1 st Publication in 2012 by University Of Rochester Press ISSN: 2161-0290 Introduction Bode Omojola’s Yoruba Music in the Twentieth Century is a combination of ethnographic documentation stemming from extensive field research spanning about two decades, and an in- depth analysis of historical data in relation to the Yoruba people and their music. The former however takes prevalence over the latter as Omojola himself agrees that save for chapter five of the book where most of his data was gathered from existing literature, his entire work culminates more from a series of ethnographic encounters. The central focus of Bode Omojola’s book is how music helps to define a people (in this case, the Yoruba people) within homogenous or heterogeneous contexts that are created by obvious, yet often misconstrued similarities and differences as typified in elements such as religion, language, gender, social and professional institutions; and by extension, how these levels of identity are negotiated and redefined along differing facets of agency. The ambivalent notions of convergent and divergent forces that have continued to inform scholarly discourses about the Yoruba people are especially brought to the fore. The fundamental definition of the Yoruba person is discussed within the frame-work of what Omojola posits as “self”, “person”, and the principle of “self-identification”; as he ultimately explicates the role that music plays in engendering identity within varying contexts. Key words: Review, ethnography, Yoruba, Identity, Agency, Performance practice. A Review of Yoruba Music in the Twentieth Century Omojola gives a brief background to the homogenous connotations of the Yoruba people. According to him, the Yoruba people spread across different nations of the world. They inhabit the West African nations of Benin Republic and Togo as well as nations in the continent of