Sub Saharan suggestions

[joel]

There's a lot of music South of the Sahara, . For that reason I plan to keep individual posts here reasonably short and concise. The idea is just to provide some pointers to some areas that may be of interest, and discover new things myself.
The point of entry is Mali, and the music of the Kora. The Kora is widely used by Mandinke peoples, not just in Southern Mali, but also in Senegal, Guinea and Gambia.
Let's cut to the chase with the first Malian Kora album:

Recorded in 1970, this fetures the greatest Kora players of the period: N'Fa Diabate, Djelimadi Sissoko, Sidiki Diabate and Batrou Sekou Kouyate. The playing on this is pretty muscular, and gives the music, despite its delicacy, a sometimes surprising drive.
Ancient Strings is available CD from Buda Music .
Sadly, most of the rest of this great series has not been released on CD (at least not officially to the best of my knowledge)

Kora players are djeli - hereditary musicians, and the next CD is a nice illustration of this

New Ancient Strings on Rykodisk/Hannibal Features Ballake Sissoko and Toumani Diabate - who are the sons of Djelimadi and Sissike from the Ancient Strings record. This is a great album in its own right. Qualitative comparisons with the "original" are a bit meaningless; it is not better or worse as the album reflects two different personalities and a different era.
These two records are, IMO, the essential starting point for Malian Kora.
Toumani Diabate is also known for his collaborations over the years with artists from other countries, and recently with Ali Farka Toure. That's for the next post, though.

 

[gusi]

"Kanda Bongo Man: Amour Fou" is one of my favourites. It is really upbeat and always puts me in a good mood.

"Cheik Lo" is a west African I really like. His music is slower and more spirtual though. His albums on world circuit are very well recorded.

 

[steve21]

Joel

That's a really great start. I suppose classifying all sub Saraha music as a single style is a bit like calling R&B, jazz, bluegrass, soft rock collectively 'North American'!

I had a look and a bit of a listen to allmusic.com and was very impressed by the range of the music from all parts of the continent. I just hadn't appreciated the quality and variety available. More fool me!

Thanks for the info

Steve

 

[kasperhauser]

Madagascar is definitely south of the Sahara, so I guess this counts:

Some really amazing guitar. Sometimes with raw but strong vocal (in Malagasay), sometimes solo or with spare percussion. Great liner notes (including open tunings used). D'Gary is maybe slightly more well known than some African musicians due to his association with David Lindley. Beautiful and unique.

Edit: ImageShack is having trouble loading the pic... anyway, it's Malagasay Guitar by D'Gary. Check out the sample for the last track.

 

[suzywong]

Boubacar Traore
Lobi Traore
Roake Traore
Ali Farka Toure

all absolutely brilliant

for more info

http://mali-music.com/Cat/MK7/Accueil.htm

 

[joel]

Here are a few selections from my (worryingly extensive) collection of field recording. AFAIK, only one of the albums here is actually in print atm (the Burundi album). Sadly, it seems likely that many of these tracks may never be released again. Apologies in advance for the quality, most of these records need another good scrub or two...

First up from Musique du Burundi on Ocora (OCR 40) recorded in 1967 - these samples are taken from an original pressing from 1968 - is an astonishing polyphony created by two girls:

Akazehe par deux jeunes filles

Sadly there was no photo of the pair. According to the liner notes, Akazehe is a greeting song. The "yodelling" effect is achieved by rapidlly alternating between chest and throat singing. This is something you could try at home.

The next track features "whispered" singing by Francois Muduga accompanying himself on an Inanga zither similar to the one in the photo below.

Song with Inanga

The whispering technique is apparently used because it creates a good balance with the zither. This example is a praise song.

 

[joel]

More female vocals - this is an audio forum after all

Polyphonies Mongo - batwa ekonda (OCR 53) recorded around 1970

Anyway, this is superb polyphony, this time from the former Democratic Republic of the Congo. One interesting aspect of this music is that it is a kind of fusion. While the women are Bantu Ekonda, there is a clear pygmy Batwa influence. Magnificent call and response, beautiful "melody" lines are of course hallmarks of Congolese music.

Choeurs de femmes Ekonda

 

[joel]

Next up some Ethiopian proto-rap. OK, I'm exaggerating, but only a little.

Ethiopia II - Cushites (Barenreiter BM30 L 2305) recorded around 1965 in Southern Ethiopia amongst the, surprise this, Cushite peoples.

As usual with Jean Jenkins' recordings, not a lot of informaiton is included. This track is Wollamo man, Soddu people, Sidamo Region. And that's about it. The Masenqo is a one string fiddle of a family that is found all over central and northern Africa.

Masenqo player sings the news

 

[joel]

Back to Ocora for Musique Kongo (OCR 35)
This a series of recordings made by Charles Duvelle in in 1966 in the Republic of the Congo at locations not far from Brazzaville

Chant de marche Ba-Lari avec sanza

Gabriel Bassoumba plays the 9-string sanza thumb piano while singing to himself.
Beads attached to the sanza help to create a buzzing drone.

 

[joel]

This is from the "legendary" Premiere Anthologie de la Musique Malienne series from the Malian Ministry of Information and released through Musicaphon-Barenreiter in the early seventies. Most people don't get past New Ancient Strings that I mentioned in the first post (and which is available on CD). However, all the albums in the series are interesting.

This is Volume 3 Le Mali des sables - Les Songoy (BM 30 L 2503)

Taganine is a Tamachek song "my girlfriend" here sung by Agou Keina Yattara accompanying himself on what I think is a two-string lute.

Taganine

 

[joel]

Muique Malagache (OCR 24 - my copy is a much later repress) was recorded in 1963 and is interesting because it explores some of the less well-known but very rich musical traditions of Madagascar. There are no valiha tracks on this album.

Te track "Merina music" is both very lovely and quite startling, because close your eyes and you could be, well, where exactly....

Merina music

This is a performance by an theatre Mpilalao troupe that features mime and dance (that's what the liner notes say) set to a rich, diverse instrumental and vocal backing

Just for fun, here's another track recorded only a few years before, somewhere else, for comparative puposes:

mystery track

 

[joel]

For better or worse, Fela domintes Western (and Eastern) perceptions of Nigerian music. This is really a shame, because thre is a huge variety of traditional and non-trad styles in the country.

Musiques du Plateau (OCR 82) was recorded in 1972 on the Jos Plateau in central Nigeria amongst the (then) largely animist local populations.

Maisage
The semi-professional Molo Orchestra of Maisage Zindam Ndam features a pair of raft zithers, instruments that traditionally are used solo rather than in ensembles. A small example of traditional musicians adapting to changing social conditions.
The song is the story of Maisage, thd eldest son of a large family, who has let his beard grow giving his face the appearance of someone much older. In view of this apparent maturity, the village elders give him an important and difficult task, to look after the sacred wood that is frequented by the spirits of the dead.
Maisage refuses: "If the elders and the chiefs are scared by the spirits, how can they expect a young man like myself to take charge".

 

[sideshowbob]

Excellent stuff Joel. Good pictures too, I reckon every thread is improved by a bit of nice album cover art.

-- Ian

 

[PsB]

Great thread Joel, thank you for taking the time to do this. An eye-opener to those of us, who like African music without knowing much about it.

 

[PsB]

The whispering technique is apparently used because it creates a good balance with the zither. This example is a praise song.

[/QUOTE]

It seems Tom Waits did not invent anything...

 

[rod]

Thanks for the excellent thread Joel.

Tony, you do need to get a seperate area for these gems ;-)

 

[messengerman]

A few of my favourites:

Thomas Mapfumo, Shumba : Vital Hits of Zimbabwe. http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00000DDEC/qid=1148129241/sr=1-18/ref=sr_1_0_18/202-7386999-2318217

Mahlathini & the Mahotella Queens

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00000EC6R/qid=1148129629/sr=1-17/ref=sr_1_0_17/202-7386999-2318217

And would second the recomendations for Kanda Bongo Man. Soukous was to the French what Dance music was to much of the UK in the nineties.


African compilations are often a bit rubbish IME but these two are really good:

Indestructable Beat of Soweto Vol 1 http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000000DW2/qid=1148129884/sr=1-5/ref=sr_1_11_5/202-7386999-2318217

And the 1989 BBC compilation Under Africa Skies REQ 745. AFAIHH this is the best whole continent compilation ever issued and not by a small margin. Very hard to find now but if you find it buy it.

 

[joel]

OK. Coming shortly another selection from various slightly obscure but utterly wonderful albums.
Maybe this thread has legs after all, and maybe I'll follow the Tamashek across the Sahara at some point...

 

[joel]

South Eastern Nigeria and the land of the Igbo Obimo people.
The recordings featured here were made by David Ames assisted by Anthony Anih in 1963-64 and 1975. A "community selection" of the tracks recorded were released in the UNESCO Anthology of African Music series as Nigeria III Igbo Music (Musicaphon BM 30 L 2311).

Ikodoro orchestras are made up of males from the same age set. They play for important functions such as births, marriages and important ceremonies such as funeral processions and "second burials" - a celebratory occasion in which the deceased is encouraged to finally leave the living and head to the land of the dead.

"The earth is a place of call, nda
Man stops here and goes on, nda"

For some masquerades a male dresses and dances as a female.

The music featured here is a masquerade performed as part of an Ogimo chief's second burial. The orchestra consists of four differently tuned side-blown calabash horn, a wooden percussion vessal that provides the "clave" as we might understand it, a wooden slit gong, two open cylinder drums, various rattles and a choir.

Ikodoro

Next is a worksong, sung by women as they grind food for a feast. The rattle is a cigarette tin with small pebbles inside.
While it's a marvellous piece of music in it's own right, the "echoes" are quite remarkable.

Grinding song

 

[murray johnson]

3 years ago we visited Tanzania. One of the highlights was spending a few days on Zanzibar, which is offshore, predominantly Muslim and which, probably due to its history of spice and slave trading has a very different feel to Dar es Salaam on the mainland. The local music there is called Taarab and we spent a couple of evenings at 'the culture music club' in Stonetown. These gatherings of local musicians took place in a large upstairs room. The audience such as it was, was divided. Men sat on the left and women on the right (due to the Muslim influence) and the musicians at the front were rehearsing for a concert that was to be held the following week. Its a lovely, gentle style with north african and indian influences and is played on a wide variety of different instruments. The women watching tended to participate and would accompany the musicians on many of the songs.

I wouldn't recommend a specific disc but if you put Taarab into Amazon it will produce a string of titles and I'm sure you'll be able to listen to samples of some of it.

If you ever get the chance to visit Zanzibar make sure you get to a practice session at the club. It doesn't cost anything and is wonderful entertainment