Adding UIBarButtonItem to UINav..Controller

Question

i am not sure what i am missing here. I Have a custom UINavigationController and i am trying to add a persistant UIBarButtonItem to the bar.

-(void)viewDidLoad
{
    self.navigationBar.barStyle = UIBarStyleBlack;
    UIBarButtonItem *bbi = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Nope..."
               style:UIBarButtonItemStyleBordered
                 target:self
                 action:@selector(goBack:)]; 
    self.navigationItem.leftBarButtonItem =bbi;
    [bbi release]; 
}
-(void)goBack:(id)sender
{
    NSLog(@"go back now");
}

what am i missing here? - BTW, i do not want to/ will not use IB.

UPDATE: Currently this is the closest i can get:

-(void)viewDidLoad
{
    self.navigationBar.barStyle = UIBarStyleBlack;
    UINavigationBar *navBar = [[UINavigationBar alloc] initWithFrame:CGRectMake(0, 20, 320, 44)];
    navBar.barStyle = UIBarStyleBlack;
    UINavigationItem *navItem = [[UINavigationItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Currently Playing..."];
    [navBar pushNavigationItem:navItem animated:NO];
    UIBarButtonItem *editButton = [[UIBarButtonItem alloc] initWithTitle:@"Close" style:UIBarButtonItemStyleBordered target:self action:@selector(goBack:)];
    navItem.rightBarButtonItem = editButton;

    [self.view addSubview:navBar];

    [editButton release];
    [navItem release];
    [navBar release]; 
    [super viewDidLoad];
}

It's terrible i have to add an entire navbar to a UINavigationController that already has a navbar....if i try to use the existing, i get this error:

'NSInternalInconsistencyException', reason: 'Cannot call pushNavigationItem:animated: directly on a UINavigationBar managed by a controller.'

....really???

Solution

navigationItem must not be set on the UINavigationController instance but on the view controller of the view which is displayed "inside" the navigation controller.

Setting self.navigationItem on your navigation controller would work if your controller was itself pushed into another navigation controller.