Rewrite and translate this title Tony Njoku is decolonising modern classical music to Japanese between 50 and 60 characters. Do not include any introductory or extra text; return only the title in Japanese.

Rocking a durag, tank top and piercings, Nigeria-born, London-based multi-instrumentalist Tony Njoku isn’t the sort of classical composer that most people would be accustomed to – but that’s exactly the point. Over the last few years, he’s embarked on a journey into a genre often considered one of the densest, dominated by Conservatory-educated musical virtuosos and with a history closely tied to Western imperialism. Primarily self-taught and with a background in hip hop, Njoku’s presence is as unlikely as it is valuable. More than just being deeply emotive, his original compositions stand for the insertion of lesser-heard voices into the avant-garde space, opening the door to a decolonisation of the genre more widely.

Going into the pandemic just a couple of years ago, however, Njoku’s music was totally different. Take 2021 release Kill Tony, for example, a dark, 808-driven experimental trap project that sits somewhere between Aphex Twin and Danny Brown. I loved it when it came out but, looking back, Njoku doesn’t. “It reminds me of someone else,” he tells me. In a funny way, though, the title was rather prophetic. As the world retreated indoors, Njoku’s artistry underwent a complete 180. He took the opportunity to get sober, and then came across a listing on Gumtree that would change his career for good: a free (albeit slightly worse-for-wear) upright piano.

Pouring his energy into restoring and mastering the hulking instrument, Njoku began to reconsider how he presented his music to the world. Far from the layered, electronic complexity of his earlier releases, his compositions took a turn towards the delicate, refining his ideas down into the pure emotions that he wanted to express.

It is in this context that his Bloom EPs came into being. Beautifully fragile and taking cues as much from floral themes as from colonial history, the series depicts a learning of a craft in real-time, slowly encroaching into a musical tradition that has historically excluded his perspective. “I used to be very obsessed with trying to be cutting-edge, but now I realise it’s not really important,” Njoku sums up of this journey. “What is important is trying to convince the world that whatever perspective you have is of value.”

Below, ahead of the release of final instalment Encore, Tony Njoku speaks on the wide-reaching influences behind this renewed artistic identity, from his Nigerian heritage to a democratisation and decolonisation of the genre more widely.

It’s funny hearing your journey, it’s almost as if you worked backwards towards finding classical music.

Tony Njoku: Yeah, absolutely. I started off making hip-hop beats and, you know, rapping with friends because there was such a low barrier to entry. That was my start in music. There was this attitude of, if you have an idea in your head and you can’t translate it, you look for samples to help you bring out that feeling. You build it on the DAW, bit by bit, note by note. With classical music, my approach isn’t that different and there was initially a fear in me that maybe this isn’t the right way. All the music is me, it’s not from anywhere else, but it comes through a rigorous process of playing, editing on the DAW, playing on the piano, editing on the DAW. In a sense, that was my way of breaking in. I didn’t go to Conservatory, I didn’t have access to piano lessons as a kid, but the computer has given me a way to get to that end product that I desire without having the traditional routes. Now, I realise that my approach is great. If you love the music, you should be able to engage with it and not feel like it’s this thing that’s ‘othered’.

Where did these inspirations come from?

Tony Njoku: There’s so many people that I look up to in this alternative, electronic space that I kind of operate in, people who are embracing the classical thing, like Nils Frahm, Space Afrika or Mica Levi. I’ve heard that Mica studied at Guildhall, and has had a lot of success since then, but on that journey they’ve flipped the idea of what a quote, unquote ‘serious composer’ is and does. They have this amazing catalogue of brilliant classical pieces that feel deliberately warped and artfully simplified. It’s like going from more figurative art to more abstract art. Rather than the virtuosic, razzle dazzle of, ‘I can do all these amazing scales’, or, ‘I’m just following the traditions of what’s come before’, I imagine that they just focus on the emotional qualities in their work and respond intuitively to it – which, for me, is always at the centre of what music is about anyway. Both the classical and avant-garde worlds can be very exclusive and technically focused but these people really opened it up for me to actually see myself as a serious contender in those spaces.

Do you think this has allowed you to insert something new into the space, too?

Tony Njoku: I feel like I have a lot to learn and work through before I can say I’m adding anything new to the space, but I’m sure if I stay intuitive and true to my perspective then there will some sense of newness coming through what I make. Like, for better or for worse, I’m a product of this postcolonial world. My heritage is Nigerian, I wasn’t born in the UK, but my parents were, and I grew up with a sort of dichotomised relationship between the two places. We spoke about Afrofuturism earlier, and what I sometimes see in that movement is this sort of rejection of colonialism and desire for precolonial ideas and traditions to be brought to the forefront.

But, for me, it would be disingenuous to relinquish the fact that colonialism has had an impact on who I am, and only look towards my African heritage for inspiration. My whole thing is this sort of general incorporation of all of it, how can I embrace and blend all these cultural traditions that I’ve grown up around to make something fresh? All the beautiful and horrific contexts that allow me to exist now, all of it has value. So what does it look like for someone like me to completely embrace the traditional classical world and then bring it into the world that I’m familiar with? And how can we create a space in the classical world where people like me can thrive?

I used to have a lot of those lofty goals of being an avant garde superstar. I don‘t think that‘s of value anymore. I think what‘s of value is expressing myself as honestly and directly as possible

A lot of your new music deals with these themes, too, like the track ‘Biafra’ [a region that briefly declared independence from Nigeria in 1967].

Tony Njoku: The Biafra story is something that’s dear to me. My father was in that war as a child, and he’s told me a lot of stories of that time. Which unfortunately share a lot of parallels with what’s happening now in Palestine. My engagement with that topic in the music was that I wanted to explore it for myself, emotionally. I’ve visited where my dad’s from in the east of Nigeria a couple times in my life, Owerri to be exact, and from hearing all those stories from veterans and my family who went through that horrific experience, I wanted to understand what it was like. What would it have felt for that sovereignty at the centre of the Biafra cause to have happened? Sonically, the track also feels like a space where I can really grow from artistically and create something fresh. It allows me to marry what I know of my heritage and tell my ancestral story through the pantheon of classical and experimental music.

This upcoming EP also features a cover of ‘Hope There’s Someone’ by Anonhi, a trans artist who won the Mercury Music Prize all the way back in 2005. What does that track mean to you?

Tony Njoku: When I first heard that track, I was living in Nigeria, which is a very anti-queer, homophobic environment. It’s still illegal even now, you get [up to] 14 years in prison. Hearing something like that, and then seeing the person who’s singing that song, was like… having the first taste of water after being in the desert for 20 days. It was like, ‘oh my God!’ It was an invitation to be more like myself – I couldn’t really articulate it at the time, but it was also like having a friend. I didn’t have any queer examples growing up. I didn’t even know what was going on with me, to be honest. Seeing Anonhi and investigating the world that they’re a part of completely affirmed a lot of things for me. It made me feel seen.

Coming full circle, then, do you think your journey can contribute something meaningful to those who come after you?

Tony Njoku: You know what, I used to have a lot of those lofty goals of being an avant garde superstar. I don‘t think that‘s of value anymore. I think what‘s of value is expressing myself as honestly and directly as possible. That doesn‘t always have to be my ideas, what I think, but also just my presence in certain rooms. Who I am is valuable in whatever space I choose to walk into and however people choose to see it. I don‘t think it‘s healthy for me – or any artist – to have a Messiah Complex at the end of the day. What‘s really important is trying to convince the world that whatever perspective you have is of value. I just want to play my part in the big human story. That‘s it.

Encore is out on November 15. Tony Njoku is celebrating at St Matthias Church on November 20.

Rocking a durag, tank top and piercings, Nigeria-born, London-based multi-instrumentalist Tony Njoku isn’t the sort of classical composer that most people would be accustomed to – but that’s exactly the point. Over the last few years, he’s embarked on a journey into a genre often considered one of the densest, dominated by Conservatory-educated musical virtuosos and with a history closely tied to Western imperialism. Primarily self-taught and with a background in hip hop, Njoku’s presence is as unlikely as it is valuable. More than just being deeply emotive, his original compositions stand for the insertion of lesser-heard voices into the avant-garde space, opening the door to a decolonisation of the genre more widely.

Going into the pandemic just a couple of years ago, however, Njoku’s music was totally different. Take 2021 release Kill Tony, for example, a dark, 808-driven experimental trap project that sits somewhere between Aphex Twin and Danny Brown. I loved it when it came out but, looking back, Njoku doesn’t. “It reminds me of someone else,” he tells me. In a funny way, though, the title was rather prophetic. As the world retreated indoors, Njoku’s artistry underwent a complete 180. He took the opportunity to get sober, and then came across a listing on Gumtree that would change his career for good: a free (albeit slightly worse-for-wear) upright piano.

Pouring his energy into restoring and mastering the hulking instrument, Njoku began to reconsider how he presented his music to the world. Far from the layered, electronic complexity of his earlier releases, his compositions took a turn towards the delicate, refining his ideas down into the pure emotions that he wanted to express.

It is in this context that his Bloom EPs came into being. Beautifully fragile and taking cues as much from floral themes as from colonial history, the series depicts a learning of a craft in real-time, slowly encroaching into a musical tradition that has historically excluded his perspective. “I used to be very obsessed with trying to be cutting-edge, but now I realise it’s not really important,” Njoku sums up of this journey. “What is important is trying to convince the world that whatever perspective you have is of value.”

Below, ahead of the release of final instalment Encore, Tony Njoku speaks on the wide-reaching influences behind this renewed artistic identity, from his Nigerian heritage to a democratisation and decolonisation of the genre more widely.

It’s funny hearing your journey, it’s almost as if you worked backwards towards finding classical music.

Tony Njoku: Yeah, absolutely. I started off making hip-hop beats and, you know, rapping with friends because there was such a low barrier to entry. That was my start in music. There was this attitude of, if you have an idea in your head and you can’t translate it, you look for samples to help you bring out that feeling. You build it on the DAW, bit by bit, note by note. With classical music, my approach isn’t that different and there was initially a fear in me that maybe this isn’t the right way. All the music is me, it’s not from anywhere else, but it comes through a rigorous process of playing, editing on the DAW, playing on the piano, editing on the DAW. In a sense, that was my way of breaking in. I didn’t go to Conservatory, I didn’t have access to piano lessons as a kid, but the computer has given me a way to get to that end product that I desire without having the traditional routes. Now, I realise that my approach is great. If you love the music, you should be able to engage with it and not feel like it’s this thing that’s ‘othered’.

Where did these inspirations come from?

Tony Njoku: There’s so many people that I look up to in this alternative, electronic space that I kind of operate in, people who are embracing the classical thing, like Nils Frahm, Space Afrika or Mica Levi. I’ve heard that Mica studied at Guildhall, and has had a lot of success since then, but on that journey they’ve flipped the idea of what a quote, unquote ‘serious composer’ is and does. They have this amazing catalogue of brilliant classical pieces that feel deliberately warped and artfully simplified. It’s like going from more figurative art to more abstract art. Rather than the virtuosic, razzle dazzle of, ‘I can do all these amazing scales’, or, ‘I’m just following the traditions of what’s come before’, I imagine that they just focus on the emotional qualities in their work and respond intuitively to it – which, for me, is always at the centre of what music is about anyway. Both the classical and avant-garde worlds can be very exclusive and technically focused but these people really opened it up for me to actually see myself as a serious contender in those spaces.

Do you think this has allowed you to insert something new into the space, too?

Tony Njoku: I feel like I have a lot to learn and work through before I can say I’m adding anything new to the space, but I’m sure if I stay intuitive and true to my perspective then there will some sense of newness coming through what I make. Like, for better or for worse, I’m a product of this postcolonial world. My heritage is Nigerian, I wasn’t born in the UK, but my parents were, and I grew up with a sort of dichotomised relationship between the two places. We spoke about Afrofuturism earlier, and what I sometimes see in that movement is this sort of rejection of colonialism and desire for precolonial ideas and traditions to be brought to the forefront.

But, for me, it would be disingenuous to relinquish the fact that colonialism has had an impact on who I am, and only look towards my African heritage for inspiration. My whole thing is this sort of general incorporation of all of it, how can I embrace and blend all these cultural traditions that I’ve grown up around to make something fresh? All the beautiful and horrific contexts that allow me to exist now, all of it has value. So what does it look like for someone like me to completely embrace the traditional classical world and then bring it into the world that I’m familiar with? And how can we create a space in the classical world where people like me can thrive?

I used to have a lot of those lofty goals of being an avant garde superstar. I don‘t think that‘s of value anymore. I think what‘s of value is expressing myself as honestly and directly as possible

A lot of your new music deals with these themes, too, like the track ‘Biafra’ [a region that briefly declared independence from Nigeria in 1967].

Tony Njoku: The Biafra story is something that’s dear to me. My father was in that war as a child, and he’s told me a lot of stories of that time. Which unfortunately share a lot of parallels with what’s happening now in Palestine. My engagement with that topic in the music was that I wanted to explore it for myself, emotionally. I’ve visited where my dad’s from in the east of Nigeria a couple times in my life, Owerri to be exact, and from hearing all those stories from veterans and my family who went through that horrific experience, I wanted to understand what it was like. What would it have felt for that sovereignty at the centre of the Biafra cause to have happened? Sonically, the track also feels like a space where I can really grow from artistically and create something fresh. It allows me to marry what I know of my heritage and tell my ancestral story through the pantheon of classical and experimental music.

This upcoming EP also features a cover of ‘Hope There’s Someone’ by Anonhi, a trans artist who won the Mercury Music Prize all the way back in 2005. What does that track mean to you?

Tony Njoku: When I first heard that track, I was living in Nigeria, which is a very anti-queer, homophobic environment. It’s still illegal even now, you get [up to] 14 years in prison. Hearing something like that, and then seeing the person who’s singing that song, was like… having the first taste of water after being in the desert for 20 days. It was like, ‘oh my God!’ It was an invitation to be more like myself – I couldn’t really articulate it at the time, but it was also like having a friend. I didn’t have any queer examples growing up. I didn’t even know what was going on with me, to be honest. Seeing Anonhi and investigating the world that they’re a part of completely affirmed a lot of things for me. It made me feel seen.

Coming full circle, then, do you think your journey can contribute something meaningful to those who come after you?

Tony Njoku: You know what, I used to have a lot of those lofty goals of being an avant garde superstar. I don‘t think that‘s of value anymore. I think what‘s of value is expressing myself as honestly and directly as possible. That doesn‘t always have to be my ideas, what I think, but also just my presence in certain rooms. Who I am is valuable in whatever space I choose to walk into and however people choose to see it. I don‘t think it‘s healthy for me – or any artist – to have a Messiah Complex at the end of the day. What‘s really important is trying to convince the world that whatever perspective you have is of value. I just want to play my part in the big human story. That‘s it.

Encore is out on November 15. Tony Njoku is celebrating at St Matthias Church on November 20.