MUSIC OF MALI, part 6

	NFALY DIAKITE TRIBUTE TO TOUMANI KONE: HUNTER FOLK VOL 1 (Mieruba-ML) From the deep well of Malian music comes another classic: a tribute to Toumani Koné by Nfaly Diakite, also billed as "Hunter Folk volume 1." The Donsow from Bambara have their own ngoni which has eight strings and a guitar-like sounding board covered with antelope skin. Nfaly Diakité studied this ancient instrument with two masters from Wassoulou: Diakaria Diakité and Oumar Sidibé, and was soon recognized for his virtuosity. In 2012, percussionist Ibrahim Sarr invited him to join the BKO Quintet, a Malian supergroup who recorded and toured to great acclaim. Unusually they featured the two ngonis from different traditions: the griots' Djeli ngoni along with the hunter's Donso ngoni. In September 2018 they played a street festival in Berkeley so I was able to experience them live and it was marvelous. On this recording Nfaly plays the percussion himself, it is the simple, restless scraper called keregne, so he overdubbed it. For the single "Mogote Diabeye (No one can please everyone)," he also made a video. The songs draw from the Donso mystical traditions revealing how they view life, destiny, love and death. There are familiar refrains common to many songs interspersed with improvised lyrics. As the producer suggests, it should be experienced as a suite, with highlights and relaxed moments within a musical continuum.
	KANKOU KOUYATE N'DARILA (One World Records) As you know West African societies have entire families who are griots: hereditary musicians or praise singers. Kankou Kouyate is no exception, being the niece of the great Bassekou Kouyate, genius exponent of the n'goni. And he shows up to add sparkle to three cuts on this album. Otherwise her voice is backed by a group of cousins, dubbed Les Etoiles de Garana, assembled for this album, comprising a medium and bass n'goni (Madou Kouyate), Lassine Kouyate on tama (talking drum) and other percussion, and a second percussionist to double on calabash, congas, and shakers. A kora player (Sefoudi Kouyate) appears on two cuts and in addition we hear keyboards and trumpet here and there. A lot of the music was improvised in the Bamako studio, based on traditional riffs. Kankou has a rich, warm voice and though she has been called "the Malian Nina Simone," we do not need trite comparisons. I feel she needs to be recognized for her originality and message on human rights.
	BASSEKOU KOUYATE & AMY SACKO DJUDJON: L'OISEAU DE LA GARANA (One World Records) I had the great pleasure to see this couple and their children performing a concert, only a short walk from my home, earlier this year (at the geriatric ward known as the Freight). It was a sublime musical evening. Both are veterans of the Malian music scene. Amy is a renowned praise singer. Bassekou plays the ngoni and his son Mamadou plays bass ngoni; a cousin Mohammed Kossebe was percussionist, pounding on the slapped gourd in concert, while the dum-dum, a variety of talking drum, was squeezed and beaten by another son. With his now-famed group Ngoni Ba, Bassekou has recorded five stellar albums, from 2006's Segu Blue, which had guests including Kassemady Diabaté, Zoumana Tereta and Lobi Traore, to Miri in 2019, which included some European rockers in the line-up. With Toumani Diabaté he formed the Symmetric Trio and he has played with Taj Majhal, Youssou Ndour, Eliades Ochoa, and Ali Farka Toure, among many likely others. Even though the ngoni is a traditional instrument, Bassekou plays it like a rockstar with runs and flourishes that would leave most Western guitarists gaping. He also has great stage-presence. In concert they cranked it up, and although they were in a small club they had the "stadium sound" button firmly pressed so the bass ngoni and percussion were stingingly loud, which was great. When they introduced the band members and each took a solo, the son on the talking drum was astonishing and the bass-playing son showed his true colors by going into an Aston Barrett riff. Nevertheless I am sure the show-biz family are proud of their sons' achievements, and there is no fear of them imploding like the Cowsills (whose every advance in show biz was derailed by their drunken controlling father; in the end the TV series written for them became the Partridge Family, which you will recall had no father!). Not that the Kouyatés need a Mondrian-painted school bus and go-go boots to get their music across. The album alternates instrumental with vocal tracks which works out very well. Garaná is the village they come from and though I don't know the legend of the bird, there is a lyrical track about it, with what sounds like slide guitar ornamenting the trance-like groove. Maybe it's possible to play the unfretted ngoni with a slide, I suppose for a musician of Bassekou's brilliance, it's easily accomplished.
	ADAMA YALOMBA TANOU (Remote Records/Studio Mali) Modern rhythms and production values meet an ancient chordophone from West Africa. Based in Mali, Remote Records is a workshop and studio space which fosters young talents and seeks to keep traditional music alive through education and promotion. This is a set of traditional music delivering the mellow Malian groove along with more uptempo tracks with guitars, bass and drums. Mostly the backing is traditional slapped gourd and scraper percussion. Adama Yalomba has adapted and mastered an ancient six-string lyre, known as the n'dahn, which his father played. First he doubled the number of strings, which are wire, and in the end it sounds a lot like a kora. But, as opposed to the kora, associated with griots, or hereditary story-tellers, the n'dahn was a casual instrument played by travelers. It is akin to the n'goni, as it is also based on a wooden armature and skin-covered sounding board. Yalomba, in fact, learned his art on a kamele n'goni which, he admits, is easier to keep in tune. This is his third album, that I know of: previously, on Waati sera he played electric guitar and ngoni as well as n'dan. That was an attempt to establish him with rock credentials, though his songwriting is strong and doesn't really need the flashy Western rock trappings. He has carved himself a niche in the traditional Malian soundscape with his mastery of this almost-forgotten small ax. He has also appeared alongside and in collaboration with many of the big names of Malian music, such as Toumani Diabaté, Bassekou Kouyaté, Habib Koite, as well as Tidiane Seck and Oumou Sangaré. He is emerging as a strong original talent.
	WAGADU GROOVES: THE HYPNOTIC SOUND OF CAMARA (1987-2016) (Hot Mule) We have to go back to 1982 to understand the genesis of this sound. That was when Jean-Philippe Rykiel, son of fashion designer Sona Rykiel, took a trip to Ghana and fell in love with African music. Back in Paris he met Youssou N'Dour and Omar Pène, and arranged half of Salif Keita's breakthrough 1987 French album, Soro. This may explain why we hear drum patterns and synthesized flutes and horns on so many Parisian albums from that era, including on this selection. Retrospectively, this gets a bit hard to take in large doses, so I skipped Ami Traoré's "Tenedo." For better or worse, Soro inaugurated a new era in the sound of African music (It features an instrument with the ominous name of "kora synth"). The artists on this album are much less-well known that those Senegalese and Malian singers, but they built large followings among their French-based African public. These fans bought cassettes in the shops of Gaye Camara, a Muslim trader from the Kayes region of Mali, who made contacts in the expat community as well as reaching out to producers in Ivory Coast, Guinea and Mauritania. The Paris sound is melodic and techno-heavy but without the guitars, traps and horns you find in the expatriate soukous albums of the same era. This album ostensibly features artists of "Wagadu"— the ancient name for Soninke people, originally from Ghana, when they were animists, before the arrival of Islam in the 13th century. Instead of aiming at the urbane white audience, as his contemporary Ibrahim Sylla did, Camara was content to feed the expats with a rootsier griot sound, as exemplified here by Halima Kissima Touré. These tracks are all by musicians from the Soninke who spread all over Africa and as far as France. And if you listen beyond the synthi string washes and snare patterns (with a crash on the 7th beat), you will hear balafon continuo and acoustic guitars characteristic of a lot of Mande musical culture. Camara released hundreds of cassettes and of course most of the artists on here have not made it to Discogs. However he scored big with Oumou Sangaré, Mah Damba, Coumba Sidibé, Kandia Kouyaté and many other Malian songbirds. Among them, Fatoumata "Mah" Kouyaté is featured here. Also among his roster, Babani Koné has broken out to a larger audience, effectively replacing Kandia Kouyaté as the main praise singer in Bamako society. Naïny Diabaté's "Sankjoy Djeli" sounds a lot like the aforementioned Salif Keita album, in fact a lot of this album does, but she has dueling electric guitars, ngoni and balafon which create more interesting textures. I suppose the category is "Electronic griot" and it is consistently high quality, as is the production. And despite the occasionally bland Paris music production there are powerful vocals as in the selections from Hadja Soumano and the powerful opening and closing tracks by Mamadou Tangoudia (using a vocoder) with a more modern production which recalls "Techno Issa." However, the two Hadja Soumano tracks are already on a Syllart double release with Tata Bambo Kouyate, and the Nainy Diabate track appeared on a previous Stern's release.
	MAMA SISSOKO LIVE (mieruba.com vinyl/CD/digital) It's almost a quarter of a century since Mama Sissoko's album Soleil de Minuit came out on Buda Musique. I included it in my Africa Top 50, which listed 50 albums I felt every fan of African music needed to own. Around then I got to see him live, as he toured with Issa Bagayogo and, while he wasn't the star of that show, he demonstrated his prowess on guitar. And like many great musicians, he responded to the audience and could fire it up on stage. So now we have a gift from the past: a live version of the Soleil de Minuit album, recorded in Paris in 1998 around the same time he was recording that, his second album. The rest of the band are the same musicians who played in the studio and are jamming. The bass (Richard Haas) is brisk, popping all over the place, the rhythm guitars in the pocket, and Mama goes off on lead guitar like the genius he is. Even the tumba player is sensational. Mama sings too. There's a shout-out to "Salsa Africana" in the title cut, which I always think of as MiniWheat (the breakfast cereal) since that's the way he pronounces it (the French title means Sun at Midnight). It's a driving relentless charge and thoroughly exhilarating. Mama cut his chops in Super Biton de Segou and here delivers a sharp reprise of their tune "Iri" (which was also on the studio album). On second guitar is Toussaint Sainé, another former member of Super Biton, so there is a continuity with that fabulous live Malian big band sound we know and love. For a change in mood we hear the hunters' donso n'goni, played by Toumani Diakité on "Boma ma," bringing the traditional music of Mali to the more jazzy sound of the modernists in concert. And in another departure, Mama plays an acoustic guitar, getting a "drier" flat tone out of the strings which contrasts nicely with the bright sound of the Fender-copy lead guitar. During his national service in the army, Sissoko (who was self-taught on guitar) toured with National A de Bamako, one of the state-sponsored bands. He even played for Che Guevara at a command performance in Mopti. This shows the strong bonds with Cuba, not just political, but especially musical. Also, Sissoko absorbed folk tunes and styles from all regions of West Africa on his travels. He fronted Super Biton de Segou from 1974 until the change of regime in 1991 effectively ended the famous national orchestras. A few individuals emerged and created careers as solo artist or in other groups: Mama Sissoko opened for B. B. King at a festival in La Chapelle, France and was invited to play at Montreux by Santana and Herbie Hancock. Here with his old stalwarts he showcases a diverse set of electric Malian tradi-modern music that is hot and driving as the wind over the dunes.
	IDRISSA SOUMAORO DIRE (Mieruba) Idrissa Soumaoro's Diré hearkens back to the classic age of Malian guitar-slingers in the mould of Ali Farka Touré. Diré is the destination of the album, the place where Soumaoro met his wife and settled for a while. Back in the 1970s this was a lovely peaceful spot, he recalls, and of course he doesn't need to remind us of the now-dire straits the country is in. His repertoire comes from the hunter's clan, and he also plays the traditional donso n'goni, associated with those Bambara musicians. Over his long life he has also absorbed influences from every other kind of music he has come into contact with, including rumba, salsa, country, R&B, but in addition to the guitar we hear flute and balafon which ground us in the arid desert of the Sahel and the uniquely West African blues sound. Growing up he borrowed a guitar and tuned it to the sound of the n'goni, as he understood the pentatonic scale better. In his teens he appeared on television, performing his own composition "Ancien Combattant," which was covered by Zao, a Congolese singer, and became a big hit. But Soumaoro kept his day job, teaching, sometimes gigging at night with les Ambassadeurs du Motel alongside Salif Keïta and Kanté Manfila. He also met Amadou Bakayoko, the blind guitarist, and relocated to the Institute for the Blind in Bamako to teach there and help raise awareness of the needs of the blind community. There he started a group called Eclipse including some of his blind students. His own solo career did not begin until 20 years ago, in his 50s; he created another hit when a song he performed with Ali Farka Touré was featured in the film Black Panther. But now Soumaoro gets the full spotlight to showcase his bluesy guitar and smooth vocals, with support from Yao Dembele on bass and organ, Yvo Adadi on drums and percussion, Cheick Diallo on flute, Bouramani Kouyate on second guitar, plus balafon (on "Don't worry," sung in English) and n'goni, played by Mohamadou Dramé. His n'goni playing is outstanding on "N'den tedi." The albums ends with "Yele," which I think is a cover of an Ambassadeurs song; Amadou Bakayoko makes a guest appearance on this track.
	INNA BABA COULIBALY DJILLY KAWRAL (Remote Records) Inna Baba Coulibaly, a Malian singer, delivers a fine album of traditional songs which, she says, she doesn't write so much as channel. Married off at a young age, she was forbidden from singing, but then her village was commanded to participate in a festival celebrating independence. With few known talents in the vicinity, she was the designated singer and with her uncle on fiddle, they won first place. Their song became well-known throughout Mali. Encouraged, she moved to Bamako where she met Ali Farka Touré, Amadou Djeliba (a renowned ngoni player) and, with their encouragement and backing, recorded her first album in one day in 1975. This new album is a call for love and peace and goes through the stages of life in ten selections, with a solid backing of traditional musicians, including her daughter on call-and-response vocals, Kandé Sissoko on ganbaré (which is a type of lute), flautist Madou Traore, and another lute, the hoddu, played by Modibo Sissoko. There is also guitar, calabash and a snare drum. There is a surreal video to go with the first single "Asina Leylé." I don't understand the lyrics but one song is called "Armée Mali" and seems to invoke Allah's blessings on the country's military. It's a superb recording and reassuring that music of such quality is still found in the war-torn and strife-ridden country.
	SOLOMANE DOUMBIA SEGOU TO LAGOS (Mieruba-ML) Solomane Doumbia started out as a percussionist and arranger with the great Salif Keita and consequently got to interact with Malian musicians of the highest level. They first met in Abidjan and the title of this album, Ségou à Lagos suggests the wider horizons of sub-Saharan Africa where there are musical currents flowing back and forth like the great rivers. In this case the music flows from Bamako south via Côte d'Ivoire, and on through Ghana, Togo, and Benin to Nigeria. The dedicatee and inspiration, Tidiani Koné (sax player of Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou), is a lesser-known Malian artist, whom Doumbia says, "inspired and arranged the rhythms that made up Fela Kuti's Afrobeat." This is a wild claim as Fela's ten-month stint in Los Angeles in 1969 is well-known to have been the motivating force behind his later music, so the influence is more likely to have been the other way, but no matter. In fact the tribute here seems to be to a more traditional Malian sound, with really sweet horn arrangements. Doumbia is pictured with sax and trumpet on the cover and the liner notes suggest he writes his material on guitar and then imagines the parts for other instruments, which fill out his vision. With a cast of young talents he captures the magic sound of Mali's big bands without slavishly recreating the regional band sound that was so big in the 70s, though it is reminiscent of Salif's music, as you might expect. The sound is nostalgic but there is a fresh touch with ngoni, bass and trap drums augmenting the other percussion, occasional keyboards and vocals from Rokia Kouyaté and Mahamadou Sidibe.
	BKO DJINE BORA (Self) A strong return from BKO the Malian quintet, who summon a djinn (the title translates as "the appearance of the genie" — I just read the Norwegian equivalent of "speak of the devil" is "Mention a goblin and he's already in your hall") so we expect a spirited invocation and they deliver. Formed in 2012 their name is the call sign of the international airport in Bamako. The year they were formed the government declared a state of emergency and if you follow the news you know things have gone from bad to worse. The military government has now expelled the UN peace keepers who were chasing the Boko Haram insurgents. They and the derelict remnants of the Libyan incursion are now at the gates of the military compounds where the Malian army is hiding. But the music endures. The members of BKO come from divergent traditions: griots and Bambara hunters (who have different instruments and approaches to song). They merge in the family of BKO with two vocalists (Fassara Sacko, Khassonké Dunun), plus Adama Coulibaly and Nfaly Diakité on donso-ngonis, as well as vocals, Mamoutou Diabaté on djeli-ngoni, Ibrahima Sarr on djembe, and Aymeric Krol on drum kit. I hear electric guitar in there also. I have seen them in concert and they are explosive. Sacko, the lead singer on half the tracks has a great throaty voice, but sadly is going blind. Here he sings about infant mortality, poverty and problems of migrants. One song that jumped out at me is titled "Bamako": from the moment it started I heard "I will follow him" by Peggy March, an American pop song from 1963 with a catchy riff. Yes, you say, there are only so many chords in pop music, but when the riff and the rhythm coincide so forcefully, I am sure there's a connection. "BKO Kagni" the next track, is another example, it has what I call the "Baby please don't go" rhythm, heard on so many Ali Farka Touré tunes. There's great variety and a driving insistence to their music that will draw you in.
	OUMOU SANGARE TIMBUKTU (World Circuit WCD101) The great Malian songbird is back with a strong set of traditional and rocking music from Wassoulou. Since the days when Ali Farka Toure coyly denied having ever listened to John Lee Hooker, Malians have come to embrace a strong R&B component in their sound. Her band features Mamadou Sidibé on ngoni, keyboards and backing vocals, Pascal Danaë on guitar, dobro and keyboards, Nicolas Quéré on clarinet, keyboards, percussion and mixing deck, Baptiste Brondy on drums, and Eliézer Oubda, from Burkina Faso, on keyboards and engineering. That's quite a set of diverse and cosmopolitan musical talents. Danaë, a wicked dobro player, is a Guadeloupean resident in Paris, known to me for his part in Delgrès, but also has backed Gilberto Gil, Peter Gabriel, Youssou, Neneh Cherry and many others. Baptiste Brondy, the drummer, is also one of the fierce Delgrès trio, so she has absorbed 2/3rds of that group into her tight unit. There is a long tradition of Antillean musicians in Paris when we think back to Eddy Gustave and his blends of African and Caribbean music, or further back to Ry-Co Jazz in the 60s. The musical envelope is a perfect container for Oumou's still-solidly Malian vocals, without falling into the big arena ponderousness that, for me, scuttled her compatriot Salif Keita's later recordings, after he moved to Paris. There is some of the "atmospherics" we associate with Salif and maybe this will eventually sound as dated, but I think these guys are really masters of their equipment. On "Kêlê Magni," which is a title I recognize from Bassekou Kouyate, I hear balafon and assume it's a keyboard sample, but there's definitely a kora in here. Or am I wrong? The sweetly stinging dobro is a strong element and a nice counterpoint to her plaintive vocals on the ballads.
	ROKIA KONE & JACKNIFE LEE BAMANAN (RealWorld RW239) Rokia Koné is a Malian singer who was part of Les Amazones d'Afrique, an all-girl band, or in modern parlance, a feminist collective. Her distinctive voice is as well-known in Bamako as those of other famed Malian songbirds, such as Fanta Damba, Oumou Sangare, Nahawa Doumbia or Khaira Arby. The other component on this disc, Mr JK Lee, is unknown to me, but I gather he is the one bringing portentous synths and ominous hovering digital sounds that bubble up from subterranean depths to envelop the singer. While I may be conservative in my musical tastes, this is indeed fresh: gone are traditional instruments, except for whispers of Mande guitar and ngoni, and to the fore we have a techno-mix reminiscent of the Studio Bogolan days when Yves Wernert brushed up the traditional sounds of Malian singer Mamou Sidibé and notably, Issa Bagayogo. Djembe jumps out of the speakers on "Kurunba," the second single off the album. Koné brings her spontaneous and improvised praise singing and ancestral Bambaran songs, such as "Anw Tile (It's our time)," "Bambougou N'tji" and "Soyi N'galanba." The last characterized by those long drawn-out Islamic plaints (or complaints) we know and love from her compatriots. With her guitarist Salif Koné they are backed by djembe, doundoun, tama, and kamele ngoni; Jacknife (who recently worked with Taylor Swift) throws together drum loops and samples for his part. Both sides work in isolation: Lee in Topanga Canyon, Koné back in Mali, yet they have a great connection. There are some mellow moments and lots of big booming bits which will appeal to fans of Swift and Lee's other products U2 and REM. All in all it's very well done.
	SUPER BITON DE SEGOU AFRO JAZZ FOLK COLLECTION VOL 1 (Mieruba-ML) This is one of the great Malian big bands of the 70s. Founded in 1966, they were four time winners of the biennial youth music competition with their electrified folk music performed by two singers with trap drums, congas, four guitarists and plenty brass (two trumpets, two saxes, flute). In 1970 they not only beat out the bands from the six other regions of Mali, their members also took top honors for best guitar, trumpet, composer, etc. Their home town Ségou was the capital of the Bambara empire in the 16th century. The Bambara beat swings harder than traditional Malinké music, with conga drums prominently driving the rhythm. After colonialism the young bands wanted to escape from the tangos, beguines and charlestons which their elders had been playing, though they had absorbed some smart ideas from Duke Ellington and other American arrangers. Band-leader is trumpeter Amadou Ba and he is assisted by saxophonist Abou Touré. In the 80s Zoumana Diarra was their drummer on a couple of great albums issued by Bolibana. Here they present a whole array of styles with some classic dreamy numbers that stretch out, in addition to the uptempo danceable tracks. "Bwabaro" is a repeat of that rocking number from "Afro Jazz du Mali" (Bolibana 40, 1986) while the closer "Garan" appeared on a 1977 Syllart album with a generic title (For some reason it's slower here than on the Syllart issue). All other tracks have previously only appeared on cassette in Mali. There are a few moments of tape flutter that could perhaps have been judiciously edited out, but presumably these tracks found on cassette are the best available copies.
	BOUBACAR "BADIAN" DIABATE MANDE GUITAR (Lion Songs Records 004) Boubacar Diabaté comes from a griot family in Mali: his mother was a praise singer but his father persuaded him to stay in school. Once he got his diploma he decided he really wanted to be a musician and after mastering tama drum and ngoni, he switched to acoustic guitar. He gigged with Sékou Diabaté of Bembeya Jazz and backed Kandia Kouyaté. Banning Eyre met him in Bamako in 1995 and stayed in touch, so when Badian was visiting New York in 2010 to accompany his wife's singing, Eyre persuaded him to record an acoustic guitar album with no vocals, percussion or electronics. He plays six and 12-string guitars, and is a phenomenal guitarist: we are rapidly hooked. The melodies and riffs are vaguely familiar but its where he goes with them that is intriguing, never resolving on the tonic but bending into minor back ways. He is joined by his brother Manfa Diabaté on second guitar who gives him the freedom to swing. I think I even detect some of the picking tricks from traditional ngoni playing in his style also.
	KADIALY KOUYATE AADO (Naxos World NXW76156-2) If you scan your Mali shelf you will note clusters of names, like the Kouyatés: Bassekou, Diaou, Kandia and Sékou. And you will know that's because these folk are griots, born into a traditional family of musicians, whether singers or instrumentalists or both. Now based in London, Kadialy Kouyaté is a kora player from Southern Senegal and a famed exponent of Mandinke culture. He taught at Dakar University before his move to the UK where he continues to teach at the University of London, as well as consulting with TV programs. His relocation has also given him the opportunity to collaborate with diverse musicians from Baaba Maal to Mumford and Sons to Shakespeare companies. Although also a singer, this is a purely instrumental album. It is mellow and demonstrates his virtuosity in a sonically sharp recording. If you are into medieval European music, such as lute pieces, you will also hear parallels although, using both hands, Kouyaté manages to sound like he is duetting with himself and this gives the music much more complexity than Byrd or Dowland. There are three traditional numbers and six originals in this peacefully flowing gathering.
	SAMBA TOURE BINGA (Glitterbeat/Indigo CBCD110) Samba Touré is laying claim to the vast arid territory of desert blues that was pioneered by Ali Farka Touré. In 2009 Samba released his first album, which was in fact called Homage to Ali Farka, and since then he has played with the cream of Mali's traditional musicians. There's calabash and other percussion plus Djimé Sissoko on various ngonis. They perform tunes from the Songhai repertoire that date back into prehistory, and modern homilies about how the world does not change but the behavior of men does, causing damage. Once they've warmed up they launch into "Sambalama," as close to the Mississippi Delta as you can get without breaking Covid protocol. Richard Shanks appears on harmonica on this and the next track which is a spontaneous jam session. Solid and groovetastic, bound to appeal to fans of this genre.
	KHAIRA ARBY NEW YORK LIVE (Clermont Music CLE003) New York-based Clermont is the leading publisher of Malian music, having issued albums by Mamadou Kelly, Oumar Konate, Leila Gobi, and Hama Sankare, among many others, and this is their third from Khaira Arby. Arby had one of the rawest voices in West African pop, but died in 2018. In our era it's possible to witness performances of such great vocalists by simply going to YouTube and typing in their name, and you might want to do that to get a sense of her electrifying impact on an audience. Clermont has chosen a live show from SummerScape, recorded live in New York in August 2010. Her regular band features Dramane Touré on lead guitar, Mahalmadane Traore on percussion and Abellow Yattara on tehardant and ngoni. There's also bass, rhythm guitars and back-up singers, so basically a rock line-up with Malian strings added. There's enough rock energy to win over the (presumably) white audience quickly as the atmosphere heats up to blistering guitar pyrotechnics. Though not listed on discogs, I presume she had a lot of cassettes under her belt and the songs are polished in performance from years of practiced delivery.
	ANANSY CISSE ANOURA (Riverboat TUGDD1129) A strong return from the Malian desert blues guitarist who began this, his second release, in 2017. He was on his way to a festival in his hometown of Diré in Northern Mali in 2018 when armed men assaulted his band, broke their instruments, and took them hostage. This traumatic experience served to turn Cissé away from music, and it was not until his first child Kady was born that he returned to songwriting. Thinking of his daughter he wrote a song about education, and another about poverty, and while he enjoys the rap music spreading in his homeland he has maintained a mostly traditional sound for his own album. He celebrates his long lineage of marabouts or religious teachers in a song called "Cissé,"which has a nice haunting slide guitar-like wail going on in the background. Another great tragedy befell Cissé with the death of his mentor and friend, Zoumana Tereta, who also happens to be my favorite soku (one-string fiddle) player. But we are fortunate that Tereta laid down two tracks for this album in 2017. "Talka (Poverty)" features him in a call-and-response with a female chorus. The production is fabulous, with great studio work augmented by the mixing, done by Cissé himself with the able help of Philippe Sanmiguel. There are two bass players, both called Traoré, and two ngoni players.
	NAHAWA DOUMBIA KANAWA (Awesome Tapes from Africa) Nahawa Doumbia is one of the great female praise singers from Wassoulou, Mali. And her cassettes sell well at home. She sings to women, principally, and for the most part records with simple acoustic backing. Her husband is guitarist N'gou Bagayoko, who backed her on her first album, La grande Cantatrice Malienne, which came out in Ivory Coast in 1981, after she won the African Cultural Institute Prize, awarded in Dakar, for best newcomer. By 1987 she was getting a bit of "Parisian sheen" with her Didadi album on Syllart, replete with synths and 'lectric geetars. Her reputation grew through the 1980s and 90s. Awesome Tapes from Africa was launched in 2011 with a reissue of her La grande Cantatrice Malienne Volume 3. In 2019 they reissued her debut Volume one, and now in 2021 have come up with a cassette, CD, LP and digital release of a new recording that restores her classic sound. For less than the price of a CD you can also access her Awesome back catalogue through Bandcamp. The title song is about all the emigrants, many of whom perish trying to get to a better life in Europe. Stay home and cultivate the land, she urges them. There is light drum programming on here, but also a lot of traditional instruments including the karignan, which is the Malian metal guiro, three ngonis (uh oh, brinksmanship), bass and calabash. Her husband is on acoustic guitar. One of his relatives does a guest vocal on the penultimate track, but Nahawa returns in full force for the closer "Follwilen" which really goes into orbit.
	SIDI TOURE AFRIK TOUN ME (Thrill Jockey) This is a digital only release from the Malian singer and bandleader who rose to celebrity with the Regional Orchestra of Gao before forming Songhai Stars. Here his singing and strumming is accompanied by the virtuoso Mamadou Kelly on guitar and backed by a calabash player. The title means "Africa must Unite," and the songs sing of courage and resilience in the face of tragedy, however none of them are translated. There are only two guitars on here, so it is a mellow set but lacks the intensity of his earlier Thrill Jockey disc Alafia of 2018, or his 2012 Koima, which included a drum kit and a fiddle player. The obvious comparisons have been made to Ali Farka Touré, but I hear a distinct originality in his guitar, and far less dependence on American blues chord progressions; this Touré remains fiercely traditional in his music though I miss the variety the flute and electric guitar brought to his earlier work (which you can also hear on bandcamp). The global pandemic has limited his ability to perform and travel, and certainly to surround himself with a big band, however this intimate concert will be welcomed by many of his fans.
	SONGHOY BLUES OPTIMISME (Self-published) I am glad someone is optimistic about Mali. After the radical Islamists took over and spent a year stoning adulterers, burning books and musical equipment and generally destroying the culture, the French army came and drove them out. This meant they had to move north to Libya and other unstable places or else to Nigeria to join Boko Haram: similarly demented fundamentalist netherthroats. Songhoy Blues is a desert rock quartet who were driven out of their home in Northern Mali. Their songs are musically simple, droning one-chord jams, or two chord see-saws ("Pour toi") or the odd sortie into three-chord blues rock ("Badala"), and as such seemed limited to my ears. I heard enough Allman Brothers derivatives in the 70s, thank you. They do break out of this with some acoustic guitar and traditional percussion and the occasional cover of Fela Kuti or Junior Kimbrough (whose song is the title track of their Meet me in the City album). Researchers found that young people's attention span is down to 7 seconds, and so if an artist doesn't grab you with a hook right from the start of their song they are going to hit the "next" button. Well, young people aren't the only ones. Spotify too have stopped paying royalties to artist when someone skips their track after 30 seconds. They suggest musicians shorten the three-minute pop song even more: chorus, no verse, hit it and quit. "We will... we will rock you." Their singing is indistinct and the one song in English says "Don't worry be happy," but blazing desert rock with flourished bluesy lead riffs doesn't cheer me, even in 3-minute bursts. The lead track "Badala" has an accompanying video, so decide for yourself.
	MAMA SISSOKO SOUL MAMA (NoComment) Mama Sissoko's father played ngoni but wanted his son to be a mechanic and sent him to Bamako to study with his uncle. But his uncle was also a musician and the lad wanted nothing more than to master the strings. When he was 21 the president of Mali heard him performing in a traditional festival and asked him to join the national Instrumental Ensemble. When Mama took up guitar it was from the perspective on an ngoni player. In the early days of Independence the radio stations played a lot of American music and Mama particularly liked soul music, which made a lasting impression on him. From his days with National Badema, one of the regional bands of Mali, Sissoko made his name as a solo guitarist and accompanist to Ali Farka Touré. Later he guested on the stellar 2008 recording of ngoni master Issa Bagayogo, Mali Koura. Now Sissoko is 75 and has brought up a virtuoso nephew who joins him on this disc, playing second guitar. One of his sons is also present, having cut his teeth as bassist in Salif Keita's band, and other Sissokos are in the chorus. The spirit of departed singer, Moussa Doumbia is felt. The late great sokou-player Zoumana Tereta appears on "Niama Toutou" and "Homage to Ali Farka Touré." We will miss his elegant presence. We hear Makan Camara on drums. There is a warm Hammond organ sound (by Manjul Souletie, a French rasta producer) which makes a lovely counterpoint to the clipped guitar and bright excursions from the ngoni (played by Abdoulaye "Kandiafa" Kone). This is another triumph, up there with what I call Sissoko's "Mini-Wheat" disc, Soleil de Minuit which came out on Buda two decades ago.
	AL BILALI SOUDAN TOMBOUCTOU (Clermont Music CLE029CD) I've come to look on Clermont releases as very special and am pleased to report on their latest offering. This is a family band of fathers and sons, uncles and cousins, from Northern Mali. Tombouctou (Timbuktu) is traditionally the place considered the middle of nowhere: 20 km north of the Niger river at Djenne, it is on the caravan route to Morocco. It was part of Morocco for centuries and became a center for Islamic learning. It finally became a tourist destination earlier this century, after the popularity of their native son Ali Farka Toure prompted the Festival in the Desert, but Toureg rebels and jihadists put paid to that with murderous rampages. This album is traditional music performed on ancient instruments but has been modernized by the players. They sing in Tamasheq (a Berber language of the Tuareg with its own alphabet), Songhai (the Songhai Empire covered most of Western Africa in the 15th and 16th centuries), French and English. A synopsis of each song is included. The music is cyclical with blazing loops on three electrified tehardant (ngonis), one bass, two regular, backed by percussion on calabashes and hands. The CD has four more tracks than the LP. There's not a lot of variety in the sound, but a little goes a long way, and if you are a ngoni fan you will dig it.