Mamadou is Toumani Diabate’s brother. The last son of Sidiki and Mariama Kouyate. His public name is Mamadou Sidiki Diabate, to distinguish him from his cousin who lives in the States, but in Mali the people call him Madou fitini, small, because he has an older brother named Mamadou. His growing art is becoming rich and mature and is not at all small.
I already thought that Mamadou had his own personal style, a technique which can be compared to that of his brother Toumani, who has in his hands a mysterious and deep magic, thanks to which it is enough for him to touch the strings of the kora to deeply touch the listener.
If you listen to Mamadou today, his impetuous virtuosos and metallic young feeling has matured into something warm and sensitive. It must be passion that allowed him to grow so quickly, passion that absorbs him completely and that makes him think, as if his attention is all towards the inside. Thanks to the daily work, hours and hours dedicated to improvisation, to curiosity towards electronics, to new technologies and to many artistic experiences and also to a lively creativity, Madou has build up his road, although it seems he has not reached his limit.
Safi Diabate
His young wife Safi Diabate, is a good singer and also very attractive especially during public shows, when her vocal charisma and her physical presence emerge in all their attractiveness. People would say that she had a nice voice but not powerful as the voice of big jelis. But her voice matured and the dark tone has become strong and today she is very admired and demanded.
While in Safi success seems to have puffed up her self esteem and her satisfaction, Madou also conscious of his value, remained gentle and delicate as if he is too satisfied by his own music to concentrate on searching admiration and other people’s appreciation.
Notwithstanding his full agenda he wanted to please us when we asked him to play for us, for Wallai Records and the special relationship established between us, both in Bamako and Rome, was the sparkle illuminating his performance.
Safi sang songs from the traditional repertoire; Kaira, which represents more than ever the blood running in Sidiki’s family up to Toumani, that they can interpret better than anyone else. When Madou played on his own, he did it to please us with something special, so he played Kelefaba and some original, beautiful and touching songs composed by him.
Africa is full of artists like Mamadou Sidiki and Modibo le gaucher, extraordinary talents and completely ignored by the record industries in the north part of the world that is by now for years concentrated in protecting a mined territory – more than from piracy – from the degeneration of tastes of music consumers. It is the result of choices that sacrifice beauty and emotions in favour of the only one metric that really measures the value of work i.e. profit that transforms all into merchandise. This is how most of the African music that reaches us is wrapped up to sound sweeter to our ears just like a product to be quickly used up.
The music that comes from Mamadou fitini’s kora, modulated by his nervous hands, is instead like an unforeseeable symphony of rain drops, a nocturnal melancholic lament, an eternal and delicate poem beyond words, an intimate combination of love and genius that can be played for long and that has no expiry date. Nothing more to say . . . . . . . but listen in silence and awaken the enchantment.
The first time I heard “le gaucher” work a guitar it was some time ago at the Tempo Night Club in Bamako . It was January and it was during Islamic festivity where there is no sacrament but celebration.
It was very early and thanks to my friendship with Madou we managed to get in without paying. “A friend of mine is playing” Madou said “you have to listen to him”. Sitting on low sofas and with a beer in our hands we realized that the music was different from the one we were used listening to. Doundoun, bass and electric guitar, they created a nervous atmosphere; acid and psychedelic improvisations just like the cold blue rays of the neon lights that were weakly illuminating the gray room of the night club.
Majari
Hypnotized by the unexpected sequence of notes coming form the guitar of the left-handed, we didn’t ever realize that the divans were slowly getting crowded with young noisy and also a little arrogant young people. It seemed nobody was paying attention to the music except us, we were staring those nervous fingers that were mistreating the strings. Long improvised songs, some sort of Jimi Hendrix coming from the Savana, supported by an obsessive groove and dark bass and doundoun.
Modibo and Fanta
Once le gaucher finished his exhibition the evening had turned into a classical sumu, a sort of celebrative party, during which the jelis who have taken over the stage, have to praise well the young who are present. The hysterical enraged screams of their girlfriends competing for who was paying more money and pulling out more “greens” – the colour of the CFA 5,000 banknote – most generous. Sons of politicians, explained Mamadou, the part of Bamako that owns the power and that makes money out of this power.
le gaucher
The left-handed kept going into my ears and in my flesh, and while we were getting ready to return again to Bamako a new encounter with him was one of my main objectives on the agenda. He was waiting for us and Toumani had already put us in contact with him.
wallai!
But what would we have done meeting him again? What would have been our requests to him? Wallai Records is the answer to those simple questions. The idea came from Moussa, to whom the name of Homunculus 1.1 - one of his electronic plunderphonia musical adventures togheter with Roberto Lycke – does not suit him, but in this case the experience with the synthetic sounds and sampling revealed precious. “Let’s set up an independent label that does field recordings……”
Moussa
The main circuit of African music does not live in concert halls nor on festival stages, but in parties and streets and this happens in Bamako for birthdays, weddings and other private celebrations. The idea was therefore to ask musicians to play for us privately in their homes and record them.
setting
This time Moussa was well equipped with a digital recorder, mixer and a couple of professional microphones. Only later we would have decided what to do with those recordings. In the mean time there was the net and the radio, later it would be about proposing good music to who ever could be able to help us find money to invite those artists in Italy. Only later we thought of a real commercial usage of this material, with the intention of splitting the income with the artists. A challenging idea.
Moriba
Le Gaucher’s house, his real name is Modibo Diabate, is in Bankoroni Arazel, a district that is located on a neighbouring hill to the President’s hill, just after the market of Suguni Coura. Tene takes us there for our first visit. She is friends with Modibo’s wife. We find Modibo playing with his group. They are preparing for us.
Modibo is skinny and kind, he always has a Liberté cigarette in his mouth, his facial features are pointy and strong, muscles and nerves below his skin and a sweet look. Bassekou Kouyate, the wizard of n’goni whom with his album Segu Blue has fully entered the international market, is seated besides him and is listening with a smile on his face to the rehearsals, keeping the time with his head. Both him and Modibo come from Segou, the ancient capital of the bambara empire. It reached it’s peak in the XIX century, under the dynasty of Monzon Diarra. Modibo knows Bassekou since they were kids, just like our calabrian-malian (from Calabria , south of Italy ) Baba Sissoko. Also in Modibo’s family the n’goni is played from generation to generation, but at 15 he switched to guitar, as it offered more possibility to express his impulsive art.
le gaucher again
Obviously he plays as a left handed but the strings are those of a right handed. While his technique recalls the style of playing the kora – thumb and forefinger pinch the strings, and the other three fingers rest on the case of the guitar – his arpeggio is the n’goni’s : asymmetric, nervous, broken, sharp – but more agile that any other n’goni. The result is a terrific soup of blues, rock and funky in a bambara sauce, that evokes at the same time electronic experimentation and the most real tradition of the jeli who lived for centuries the savana of the inner Niger delta region.
Majari and the Djeliya
Modibo Diabate has played with everyone in Mali , also with Kandia Kouyate’s group – on the album called Biriko – with the traditional Mandekalou ensemble, in tour on both the albums. When he plays electronics with his group, The Djeliya, on the second guitar he is accompanied by Mody Diabate, by Bagaushu on the n’goni, by Cheick Niang on the bass, by Sidi Kone on jembe, by Baba Diabate on the calabash and by Drissa Kouyate at the tama and karignan. The there is Majari Drame, his wife. She is well known jeli, her voice is sensual and expressive voice.
Majari Drame
Modibo and Majari are extremely calm people. We have been together with them more than once, we ate together and we have accompanied Majari to a wedding in her district and in all occasions we felt the hospitality, the friendship, the trust and the warmth of their truthfulness. Both Modibo and Majari are musicians with a personal and distinguished style, both are friends we want to bring to Italy , as we are sure that many who are eager of new rhythms and sounds will find satisfaction in their music. But while we wait for their arrival or even for the release of their album for the Wallai Records, you will have to please yourselves with a little sample.
And if someone should be interested in organizing a concert, public or private, give us a ring.
corde Strings
Autore: Modibo "le gaucher" et les Djeliya Titolo: (WALLAI 002) Anno: 2009 Label Wallai Records
We had just walked out the National Museum of Bamako. It was hot, before looking for a taxi to go back to Badialan, we were sitting under the shade of a big tree and a CD seller came gently close to us with a bag full of CDs. While going through the usual copies (non originals) of Salif Keita, Toumani Diabate, Ali Farka Toure and Oumou Sangare, we found a CD that we had never even seen an article about in the official discography.
The title is “Ba Togoma - Mande Music from Mali”, and the author is Sidiki Diabate. On the front cover is Sidiki standing with his kora and besides him a small child – Mamadou Diabate, his last child – with a small kora proportioned to his size.
Sidiki Diabate
T.P. Africa has already spoken about Sidiki Diabate, father of Toumani Diabate. He transferred from Gambia to Kita just after World War II during the colonial times when he was part of the Kaira movement, created by the young jeli of Kita, which widely spread all over Mali very quickly. This movement takes its name from a song which became famous due to Sidiki’s kora arrangement, which supported Mali’s independence war and accompanied Modibo Keita to presidency.
Kita is a small city not more that two hundred kilometres north from Bamako, in the desert of Kayes, on the road that brings to Senegal. Kita was given by the first Emperor Soundjata Keita to the Tounakara family in exchange of their hospitality towards him and his mother during his exile. Kita has become during the centuries, one the places where the ancient jeli culture is orally transmitted.
> Kita
Kandia Kouyate, Keletigui Diabate and Bako Dagnon come from Kita. Sidiki’s transfer to Mali was the homecoming to his place of origin. His family originally comes form Kita and it was his father who in fact transferred to Gambia, in the village called Brikama.
Within the mandengue Sidiki is considered a gnara, the maximum degree for a jeli, and also a powerful marabout, expert in traditional medicine and traditional magic. He possessed great powers. His house in Bamako was built after the independence war on a piece of land that was given to him by Modibo Keita, beneath a hill over which the president lives.
Kita
Sidiki was one of the founders of the dell’Ensamble National Instrumental du Mali, one of the traditional and most important orchestras of all Africa. In 1971 together with Batourou Sekou Kouyate and Djelimady Sissoko, he recorded Cordes Anciennes for the German label Barrenreiter Muscaphon. For the first time here the kora plays alone, without singers or any other instrument.
Ba Togoma comes from British National Sound Archive and is was recorded in London by Lucy Duran and published as LP in 1987. The ensemble is composed by Sidiki, by Djelimadi Sissoko at the kora (or maybe Toumani Diabate, as we have read somewhere) by Bouraima Kouyate on balafon, and by the wonderful voices of Djelimadi Sissoko and of Mariama Kouyate; Sidiki’s wife and mother of Mamadou and Kandia Kouyate who at the time was about 20 years old.
Sidiki and Mamadou
Not only it is beautiful but is also rather well recorded, considering the very few recordings available of Sidiki Diabate, Ba Togoma is also an historical important documentation, which can not be found on line. For this reason we propose it fully on T.P. Africa. Enjoy.
Author: Sidiki Diabate Title: Ba Togoma - Mande Music from Mali Year: 1987 Label: Rogue Records
Once turned off the generator that was providing power to the neon lamp and to the light that Robert was using for his film, the stars of Kela’s sky and the charcoal fire remained the only source of light in the black African night. The people of the village were all back to their huts and around the fire together with us stayed Kasse Mady, Lafia and Amara.
On the Niger
Kasse Mady puts a tape into the old tape recorder he brought with him from Bamako and while the songs of his last album flow, he talks about the future and about hope. On the other side of the fire Amara replies to a question on the meaning of being a jali in today’s Africa. He disagrees with the selfishness of many young griots of Bamako and he anticipates in French a summery of the speeches held in malinke in the music of the jalis from Kela, which we would have translated only upon our return. In his last album Kasse Mady sings Sansan, a song for a friend – Amara explains – the essence of jaliya is not to praise for money.
Lafia Diabate
Wrapped around odorous smoke, the cold becomes bitter and bitter, and we cuddle around the flames, the face becomes boiling hot, while on our backs you could feel the freezing humidity blade. When the fatigue is about to overwhelm us, we decide to go back into our huts, and while we fall asleep Lafia, who is the only one left close to the fire, takes his guitar and starts singing beautiful sweet melodies that will accompany us into our sleep. Half way through the second song I drown into the unconscious and into forgotten dreams.
guesthouse Fama
The morning we wake up late and already full of people all around the trees and around the huts. While we drink Nescafe and we eat Kela’s bread, Amara explains that the cold during the night comes from the river Niger that passes a few hundred meters from here. He then asks us if we want to go and see it, and we reply yes without hesitating. We are all thirsty of Africa, and almost unconsciously we understand that the best way to quench our thirst is by not refusing any of the things we are proposed. For this reason we reply to whatever proposal with a collective and firm “yes”, also if this upsets irreparably our vague programmes.
toward Djoliba
We are on Cheick’s Toyota and in a few minutes we drive across the bushes and we reach the bank of the river, but the river is small, calm and only a few meters wide, it was not what we were expecting to find of the great Djoliba. Amara explains that this is a small lateral branch and that the real river is ahead, beyond the red sand dunes, and that to reach it, we would need to walk a little. You want to see it? Our reply is taken for granted.
ford
We reach a point where the river is low, we take off our shoes and we dip our feet into the fresh and crystal water. A feeling of freedom and energy crawls up my legs, but the road to the real river is still long. The orange sand is made of small fragments now cooked and hardened bye sun. This sweetly rubs our feet. We cross over other two branches of the river and each time our feet enter into the water, we feel the same freedom and in addition also a feeling of great respect for the so big and important river. This river is important for the people and for the big West African Empires. After having caressed our skin this water will flow towards the north, will touch the desert and cross the state of Niger and the whole of Nigeria, from the Sahel up to the forests of the Atlantic coast. Maybe some fragments of us will reach the ocean or maybe will settle somewhere during its course, or who knows where.
Moriba and Amara on the dune
After having climbed up a steep sand dune we find ourselves in front of a plateau of orange sand, beyond which, distant, we see silver, the main river and a gray spot on the other side. The harmattan paints the sky white and the air is fresh.
on the pinasse
Walking, with our shoes in our hands, we meet a fisherman on his way back to his village with a small sack containing cat fish and carps. The shits of the cows, dried under the sun seem like black flowers sprouting from the sand, while the river oyster’s shells seem like pieces of broken vases. A pirogue has just shored on the river bank and Amara asks if we want to reach the other side of the river. So we get on the pinasse and we settle so that the weight is well distributed while the two young boys position themselves at the foot and head of the pinasse and with the help of long wooden sticks they push the boat away from the river bank.
on the river
It takes some time to cross the river, resembling the sea, approximately half an hour. When we reach the other side, close to the village of Namina we are welcomed by the powerful singing of a jali, who evidently was informed of our arrival because she was referring to Kristina calling her Djeneba, her African name. The jali is Amara’s sister.
jali in Namina
In Namina, people work the seeds of karite. They are first pressed with big wooden mortars and then grinded with a rudimental machine. From here comes the dense oil which is dark brown. Upon being filtered this will become karite butter. Here they sell it in small packets of at least three kilos and are wrapped into leafs. It is used as skin cream, hair cream, as medication, to put inside the nose to protect from the dust and it is also eaten in small doses. But before seeing how the karite is made – Amara explains – it is good habit to pass by the chief of the village to introduce you, to greet him and to be welcomed by him.
Transhumance in Namina
When we return to the pinasse the children of the village accompany us smiling and making a lot of noise. During the walk we encounter a herd of cows accompanied by some peul shepherds who have come here from the north because during the dry season there is more water. In May, when the rains commence, before all turns into mud they will move again heading north. It is the migration called transhumance. The nomad shepherds are established close to the village, where they exchange their milk with mill and rice. While we leave, on the river the children stay quite some time looking at us and waiving good bye.
Warakun - grandchildren of the head of village
The following stop is at the village called Warakun, a couple of kilometres heading north. Amara is friends with Fode, the son of Sekou Keita, the chief of the village. After greeting his father we sit under the veranda of his son who offers us tea and peanuts. Then before leaving, Fode gives us two chickens, apologising for their small dimensions. We pay back with money.
Twins
While returning to the river we meet women who are washing clothes and a mother sitting on the ground with two twins in her arms, fishermen, curious children, and two young boys who are trying to load a motorbike on the pinasse. On our way back the sun has ripped the white of the harmattan and has warmed our skin, and the cool gentle wind creates little waves offering us some beautiful sensations. The vast sand plain and the lateral branches are now familiar. We walk frivolously, with the feeling of life pulsing inside our muscles and running within our blood.
on shore
We find Kela waiting for us. We eat rice and pieces of a big fish called capitain. We then go to the old men of the village who are reunited in the veranda in front of the chief’s house. They are waiting for us to say good bye and for the blessings to protect us during our trip back. “You have offered your respect to Kasse Mady and Kela, for this you are respected, Kela is your village, you can come here when you want and you can stay also one month”. Kasse Mady then brings us to see his parents’ home and the round hut where all the jalis of Kela meet up to take important decisions. While we were on the river Niger, Amara explained that the day before the council had met to decide the composition of the delegation supposed to leave Kela to participate to a funeral of an important jali in a village in Guinea. Lafia, Amara and other two would leave the following day and they will travel the whole day, 500 km track crossing the woods. They have to go because a delegation of this far away village had done the same some week before.
Amara with the elder
The sunset has almost arrived, and the road back is long and dangerous, so we leave immediately. We all had the same sensation; that would should have stayed at least one more day, and that we would return because Kela has filled us up with treasures and we have intentionally left there a piece of ourselves, so that we will have to return.
Amara and Awa Diabate
During the following weeks we did not return to Kela, but Kasse Mady informed us on what was going on there every day. He said that in Kela people frequently speak about Djeneba and the Italian friends about the night around the fire and about the strange and deep relationship established with people coming from so far away. Joking, we have imagined that from now on the story of Djeneba de l’Italie would have been passed on from father to son by the jalis of Kela, through out the centuries, together with the stories of Soundjata Keita and of Samory Toure.
souvenir of Kela
Listen Guide
Bajourou - Big String Theory - Bajourou - Big String Theory - Bajourou means, “Big strings”, acoustic music without percussion, played between friends and not in celebrations. This record, recorded in Bamako in 1992 by Ben Mandelson, is the encounter of two big guitarists Bouba Sacko and Djelimady Tounkara and the voice of Lafia Diabate, brother of Kasse Mady. Due to its pureness and simplicity it is considered one of the best albums recorded and most representative of the traditional malinke music. Tracks: a) Fanta Barana b) I Ka Di Nye c) Jodoo
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For some people Africa is a continent that has stayed behind, a pre-modern society unable to keep the pace with the rest of the world. According to us, those who look at only this aspect of Africa, lose the best part and implicitly deny the African society a possibility to evolve. To understand and to appreciate Africa today, it is not enough to highlight the misfortune and its human rights, and it is not even enough to be satisfied with the myth of a vanished world, of an eco-sustainable tradition man-sized world. The African culture has to be recognized and revealed, but for this to happen, this needs to be made available. T. P. Africa wants to be a small bridge reaching a living land. The suffix T. P. - Tout Puissant (almighty) - wants to highlight Africa's potentials, that sometimes are not expressed, but when they are expressed, just like with music, often remain unknown. Wallai Records promotes the listening of music too often forgotten, making available cultural manufactures that otherwise would be inaccessible.
ASCOLTA Mamadou Sidiki Diabate
T. P. Africa wants to be a small bridge reaching a living land. The suffix T. P. - Tout Puissant (almighty) - wants to highlight Africa's potentials,
