By Prof Soji Adejumo
Writing a tribute on Dr. Victor Omololu Sowemino Olunloyo is like carrying out an anatomy on a mathematical, musical and philosophical genius. It’s a rare combination in a human being. A philosopher, a psychic, a mystic and a poet.
“The memory of a great man is like a candle in the darkness, illuminating our path and guiding us forward”
If mathematics, music, the literary arts and philosophy are codified into an earthly religion, Dr. Omololu Olunloyo would be its high priest. Dr. Olunloyo ministered at the altar of the highest intellectual faculties.
In a scenario akin to general relativity, writing a tribute on this intellectual enigma is like reworking different tributes Dr. Olunloyo has written on tens of other people over the course of six decades. In each tribute is a tribute on himself. when his official biographer informed me of his commission to write his biography, I knew the task would be simultaneously difficult and easy. Easy because, the great man has written or contributed to so many lectures, books, monograms and other publications that you can find part of his autobiography in every publication. The difficult part is it would take a very high degree of ingenuity to unravel and put together all those pieces of auto-biographical works. He has expressed parts of himself in all his literary works.
My personal relationship with Dr. Omololu Olunloyo started in 1968 when I got admitted into Ibadan Grammar School and he was the Commissioner for education in the cabinet of the then Colonel Adeyinka Adebayo. My late father was the Vicar of St David’s Church kudeti and his in-law as Dr. Olunloyo was married to my aunty Funmilayo who is my father’s cousin. We are both descendants of priests as my father, grandfather and Dr. Olunloyo’s grandfather were Anglican priests. His father and my grandfather (The late Rev. J.S. Adejumo) were founding members of the Ibadan progressive Union (IPU).
However, his influence on my life started during my first year in Ibadan Grammar School in 1968 when I was awarded the Western State Government Scholarship for my “0” Levels. I later went on to receive the C Zard Scholarship for my higher school certificate “A levels”. After my higher School course, I started making plans to travel abroad for my university education.
Meanwhile, I had been offered a direct entry admission to the University of Ibadan but I did not accept the offer, neither did I decline or defer it. I simply ignored it until the offer lapsed. Unfortunately, my quest to travel abroad fell through and I decided to take up the University of Ibadan offer which had already expired. I ran to Dr. Omololu Olunloyo. I caught up with him in his office at the department of Mathematics in the University and explained my plight along with my expired admission letter. He jumped into his car and we drove straight to see the University registrar. The registrar was Mr. S. J. Okudu. VOSO simply marched into the office with me in tow and started a monologue with the registrar. I remember his words very clearly “My nephew had an admission which had lapsed, I would want you to resuscitate the admission now so he can start his enrolment and make the matriculation” Mr. Okudu was trying to let him know it was a bit difficult but VOSSO would not listen. He was offered a chair but he refused it and said he only wanted my admission letter resuscitated. After marching up and down the registrar’s office for several minutes still reciting his monologue, the registrar called the admissions officer and directed that a fresh admission letter be issued to me. That was how I entered the University.
Due to my late admission, I had a bit of an initial challenge with accommodation and I was practically living with him and that was the beginning of a ritual he initiated me into. It was a ritual which started early on Sunday mornings and ended very late in the evening. I was already a prolific pianist, organist and music enthusiast and Dr. Olunloyo had started acquiring a vast library of classical music which has become a collector’s dream anywhere and in any locality. We would start the day with classical music by the greatest composers in the likes of Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, Handel, Schuman, Tchaikovsky, Chopin etc and also the works of celebrated conductors, pianists, violinists and soloists. He had the music on vinyl records in those days and also the sheet music scores of some of them. I would play some of the scores on his piano and he would give me a comprehensive lecture on every piece and the history and background of the composers including information not readily available on some of them. The sessions would be generally serviced with surplus bottles of cold beer and fried chicken. I would leave the sitting room at the end of the day with wobbly legs and go to the lecture room the following day with a hangover. That ritual lasted till the end of the first term when I realized I would have to make a choice between acquiring an external “degree” in music and entertainment in Dr. Olunloyos house or a degree in Animal Science from the University. I opted for the latter and gradually weaned myself of the odd bucolic routine but our mutual bond with music lasted till his transition. Thankfully he got a federal government appointment as the head of the National Science and Technology Development Agency and that enabled me to escape temporarily from the music/beer and chicken ritual. However, when I finished my undergraduate degree, I went to him and asked for employment in his agency. He flatly refused and commanded me to get back fully into pursuing a goal of acquiring postgraduate degrees before looking for any type of employment. He said he could employ me instantly and post me anywhere in the country but he would not as he wanted me to go back to the University. I was initially disappointed by his stance of which my father was extremely happy and contented. The oracle has spoken and he must be obeyed. I ended up with a doctorate. A few weeks after my doctorate degree he was given the governorship ticket of the NPN and I was extremely sad because many of us younger ones considered Chief Obafemi Awolowo as a mini god and the anointed savior of Nigeria and Yoruba people. Those not in the Action group were considered traitors. More so Uncle Bola Ige was an Old Boy of Ibadan Grammar school and my father’s junior in the school. I was a political neophyte at the time. In annoyance, I went to Dr. Olunloyo’s house where I met a huge number of NPN bigwigs eating and drinking and various groups were huddled together in meetings. I went upstairs where Auntie Funmilayo also served me a plate pounded yam and isapa vegetable (which was an unusual soup in Ibadan) soup with the traditional beer to complement it all. In the course of the meal. VOSO came up and saw me but before he could talk, I got up and asked him why he would commit a sacrilege by aligning against Chief Awolowo and Uncle Bola Ige. The great VOSO completely ignored the question only to simply ask why I was sweating in the room. I replied, it was due to the hot Pounded yam and the equally hot isapa vegetable soup. He nodded and said, “keep eating the pounded yam and the soup, as soon as you finish it just go and leave the politics to us”. With that he left the room! That was vintage VOSO, the man who will later award the title of Ooni of Molete to himself!
Several years later, we rekindled our Sunday afternoon ritual of music but now without the beer and chicken but we would still spend hours in his Molete library playing amid listening to the great classicals. Over a course of about 60 years, he has acquired such a huge and unmatchable library of music in Cds, DVDs and Books with an auction value running into million of dollars. A few years ago, I asked him what plans he had for the protection and preservation of the INESTIMABLE collection of books and music in his library and he told me what he had done, which I believe will help to preserve this rare library in all its glory and also in its original form. The genius in VOSO can never be matched or replicated in an ordinary mortal. It is simply impossible. He had the most historical and mathematical mindset like no one else I knew on earth. He had the rarest of books on mathematics and on music that would require a trip to the ends of the earth to find them. From books on “the mathematics of music”, to “the music of mathematics” and on the origins of algebra and the theory of numbers, he had them. He would spend hours explaining concepts that were completely alien to me about mathematics and I dared not let the genius, the deity, know I was not comprehendimg anything!
He shocked me one day when at a public lecture I was invited to deliver at the Omolewa nursery and primary school 50th anniversary, he took the microphone and announced that I am a genius of musical interpretation because I recognized what Wolfgang Mozart did even before coming into contact with his iconic works on them. This was simply because I had attempted to transpose a solo aria “Rejoice Greatly, O daughter of Zion” from Handel’s Messiah from soprano to tenor as the organ accompanist for its performance because the soprano could not achieve the high vocal notes of that piece, after many failed attempts. I was convinced that the vocal registers of west African Voices may be deeper or lower than European vocal boxes and so I considered a lower transposition a good option. However, my senior organist absolutely refused as he considered it a treasonable offence to tamper with the great Handel’s tonal arrangement. I reluctantly abandoned that experiment.
A few weeks later, during our routine Sunday ritual, Dr. Olunloyo asked us to listen to Mozart’s rearrangement of Handels’ Messiah. That was my first time of knowing that Mozart dared to rearrange the Messiah. We started to play the cds and when it got to “Rejoice greatly….” the arrangement was sung by a Tenor!!! I was enthused and out of excitement I narrated my attempts and how Mozart had proved me right. Note though, that Mozart only dared to tread because Handel was no longer alive at the time. Since then, he kept calling me a genius of musical interpretation!
But VOSO had the last word — After the oratorio, he asked me the fundamental difference between the works of Handel with other European composers and with Mozart’s works. Before I could muster an intelligible answer, He quickly emphasized that Mozart’s works were more German than any other German or European composers because his compositions were harsh just like the German language! He now proceeded to lecture me on how the tonal linguistics of the German language is the harshest in the world. His lecture would have generated a huge and robust discourse in linguistics.
I am not sure the world really knew the depth and content of Dr. Olunloyo’s brains. The same genius he had in Algebra Geometry, he possessed in Poetry, music and culture. He was the Nigerian version of the Greats, like, Albert Einstein, Leonardo da Vinci, Isaac Newton, Stephen Hawking, Nikola Tesla, etc. Truly and Truly, a star has fallen. The shining light is dimmed. Good night and rest in peace, Great Master and Genius
Prof Soji Adejumo is the Ajiroba of Ibadanland, and Asipa Olomi of Omi Adio
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