Ali Farka Touré

Ali Farka Touré was one of Mali's best-known musicians, and rightly so.  A dedicated musician with a unique, instantly-identifiable sound, Touré put out numerous solo albums, as well as collaborative works with American bluesmen Ry Cooder and Corey Harris, guest tracks for singer Boubacar "Kar Kar" Traoré and balafon-player Kélétigui Diabaté, and two excellent duo albums with Mali's own kora virtuoso Toumani Diabaté, both Grammy Award winners.  A polyglot, Touré spoke Fula, Songhai, Bambara, French and (I would imagine) at least some Tamashek.  He also amazed the world music crowd when he backed Toumani Diabaté on their two collaborations, playing dozens of traditional Mandé melodies from an entirely different musical tradition than his own.  Among Malian musicians, notorious for their mutual "treachery" (janfaya in Bambara), Touré left behind an impeccable reputation as a kind and gracious individual, generous with his praise of other musicians.  Finally, in the last part of his life Touré owned Mali K7, the country's foremost legal CD production facility and was named mayor of his hometown of Niafunké.  

This week, I'm profiling two of Touré's best albums, Radio Mali and Niafunké.  Both appeared on the excellent Nonesuch/World Circuit label in the late '90s, and they showcase Touré's range, from solo songs to full band numbers, acoustic to electric.  Touré accompanies himself on both albums with guitar and n'jarka single-stringed violin.  The songs on Radio Mali are culled from recordings made at the Office de Radiodiffusion et Télédiffusion du Mali, Mali's national radio and television station in Bamako, the capital, from 1975-1980.  They tend to be spare and acoustic, often understated duets between guitar and n'jarka, in perfect counterpoint to Touré's dry, even hieratic voice.  Niafunké, in contrast, is plugged in and immediate, uncompromising in its groove.  Hand-claps, djembe drums and electric bass all revolve around Touré's wailing electric guitar.  There are some slower, and sweeter moments to Niafunké, though; the sentimental "Cousins" (about Mali's ethnic Tuaregs) and the n'jarka/djembe rocker "Jangali Famata" highlight Touré's acoustic chops.  

For the dedicated Ali-phile, there are plenty of other albums to be enjoyed (notably Ali and Toumani and his early Yer Sabou Yerkoy), but for newcomers to his music, these albums are highly recommended.  Whether you understand a word of what he's singing or not, Touré's music is infectious, instantly drawing the listener into a new, welcoming sonic world.

A final note: there's some wonderful free recordings of Touré accompanying the famous Timbuktu singer Khaira Arby available on the blog of Music Time in Africa, a long-running radio show on Voice of America.  Check it out.

Album Review: Amadou & Mariam, Sou ni Tilé

This is the first of an occasional series of African CD reviews.

Amadou Bagayoko and Mariam Doumbia, better known as Amadou & Mariam or "The Blind Couple of Mali," are two of Mali's best and best-known musicians.  They rose to international prominence with their Manu Chao-produced 2005 album "Dimanche à Bamako," and have since released several commercially successful crossover albums, most recently 2012's "Folila," which featured such varied artists as Bassekou Kouyate, TV on the Radio, and Jake Shears of the Scissor Sisters.  

Commercially, the duo has never done better, but aesthetically, they're continuing to drift further and further from what I think of as their core sound.  Frankly, I'm not a fan of A&M's post-"Dimanche" albums, so I've decided to go back to the roots of their career with a review of their first album.  

"Sou Ni Tilé" ("Night and Day" in Bambara) was Amadou & Mariam's first international album, released in 1998.  It's a big album; more than an hour long, and filled with A&M's musical influences, both Malian and Western.  Amadou's understated, solid accompaniment and solo guitar is supported by drums and flutes of every variety, brass, harmonica and Hammond B3 organ.  This is a studio album par excellence, with a host of supporting musicians including "Mr. Matu" aka François Matuszenski, the current keyboard player for perennial French New Wave rockers Indochine, and the classically trained Hindi violinist Johar Ali Khan.  

The sound presages that of later A&M albums like "Tje Ni Mousso" (Men and Women) and "Wati" (Time), but hits harder than either.  The duo's distinctive sound, built on Amadou's pentatonic call-and-response electric guitar melodies and Mariam's piercing, nasal voice (which sounds much better than my description!) is even present on the heavily-produced "Dimanche à Bamako," certainly their best-known album.  But to my ears, "Sou Ni Tilé" is the purest mix of A&M's songwriting and aesthetic with Western artists.  There are love songs ("Je pense a toi," "Mon amour ma cherie," "On se donne la main"), songs exhorting the listener to work ("Baara"), songs about the necessity of courage and solidarity in the face of life's difficulty ("Combattants," the refrain of which translates as "Life is a fight, and we're the fighters" and "C'est la vie"), and praise-songs for groups as diverse as the Dogon ethnic group ("Dogons") and employees of the national radio station, ORTM ("A radio mogo").  Rounding out the album are a few all-Bambara language tracks and the excellent "Pauvre type" (Poor guy), a minor rocker (in French) detailing the preparations of a penniless Bamakois for a weekend party with his buddies.  

Having honed their chops and written new material in Ivory Coast (see the Sonodisc release "Se Te Djon Ye"), A&M were if anything over-prepared for their first international album.  Of the pre-"Dimanche" albums, "Sou ni Tile" is by far the strongest.  The first track, "Je pense à toi," remains one of their most durable hits both in Mali and abroad, along with the classic (and thematically similar) "Mon amour ma chérie " (My love my dear).  Another song I heard a lot on ORTM (Mali's national radio station) was "A Chacun son Problème" (To each his problem), which twists a traditional Bambara proverb to ask the rhetorical question "Be kunun kunan t'i ka sogoma da wa?" (Whenever you wake up, isn't that your morning?).  The mix of Western elements, including the electric guitar, organ, and harmonica, and Malian elements, like A&M's constant use of proverbs, call and response guitar phrases, combine to produce a universal album on such themes as love, human responsibilities, and the necessity of struggling against a difficult world.  Amadou & Mariam are at the pinnacle of Malian rock right now, along with Bassekou Kouyaté, and for anyone who's been seduced by their pentatonic grooves, "Sou ni Tilé" is a must-have album.  Highly recommended.