Two generations of kora players

[seeline]

Also, TMG, I can't agree with this:

...and the reason why I posted what at first seems fairly marginal material here. Toumani Diabate, Dembo Konte and others are pretty much the Wynton Marsalises of Mande music.

They've had the great good fortune to be recorded by a couple of Western labels *and* have seen some of their releases sell well. I can't see how this has anything to do with Marsalis or what he's been doing (or not).

Amadou and Mariam have had a similar experience, partly (I'm sure) due to the fact that there are so many people from French-speaking W. Africa living in Europe now. I don't think that invalidates what they do (whether I like it or not), and I'm very wary of judging musicians - in general - in the terms you're using. (Ditto for Salif Keita, Youssou N'Dour, Papa Wemba and many others...)

La plus ça change, la plus ça meme chose. (or something like that.)

Edited January 23, 2010 by seeline

[seeline]

Also, MG... not to be too dogmatic myself, but by "first generation," I'm assuming that you're referring to the first generation of kora-playing djelis who have made recordings?

I also think - fwiw - that it might be a good idea to put this in a slightly larger context, of both djeli instruments (ngoni, balafon, xalam, etc.), of women djelis who have been recorded (like Mah Damba), and more.

I *don't* think that the Western recordings of kora are happening in some kind of isolation, or that they're necessarily separate from the larger context - of recordings made by djelis on other djeli instruments + vox. (Which is definitely a djeli instrument!)

Does that make sense?

Edited January 23, 2010 by seeline

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

http://www.coraconnection.com/ - good site for info. + lots of rare recordings for sale.

I seriously have to wonder if some things here aren't a bit overstated - just because certain kinds of recordings are made for non-African audiences doesn't mean that people in W. Africa aren't listening to - and perpetuating - this music. That's equally the case with other djeli (griot) instruments like the ngoni.

Oh yes; some people definitely are - other kora players. But, as I riffle through the back rooms of shops in Senegambia, I've never, ever, seen any recordings - not even pirates - of any of these kora players. Not even in Brikama, where the Kontes and Jobartes live and are well known on the street, do the cassette shops sell their stuff, or that of the other kora players. But they have a ton of the more modern Mandinke music, and people coming in to buy all the time I was there.

So many recordings are made for strictly "local" markets... and they seldom find their way to the West, let alone penetrate the consciousness of Westerners. Folks might want to check the following blogs for info. and some music:

http://wrldsrv.blogspot.com/

http://www.voanews.com/english/Africa/blog/ - this blog has a ton of things that might surprise old Africa hands.

http://awesometapesfromafrica.blogspot.com/

I hadn't come across the Voice of America blog before, thanks. The other two are very interesting indeed.

MG

PS - by the way, I wasn't trying to imply that the skills of these players aren't being passed on. As you point out by reference to the ngoni and other instruments, there are great players on these instruments, and there will continue to be. And so are the skills of instrument makers. (The business of learning to play a kora, involves making your own instruments - getting larger as the child grows up. But the bala is usually made by a specific tradesman.)

[seeline]

MG, with all due respect, you may not have been in the right shops for that, or in places at the right time. (when cassettes of kora players were available.) They do exist, as do older cassette recordings of djelis playing ngoni/xalam/whatever other local name the instrument has.

I'll leave it for now.

Edited to add: the VOA blog has a treasure trove of Senegalse Sufi music - that genre has yet to be picked up by anyone in the West. If I could, I'd spend some serious time/money on picking up recordings of this music, and I do hope that it gets more exposure outside of W. Africa...

Edited January 23, 2010 by seeline

[seeline]

A quick add: http://djembefola.com/board/

Although this board is focused on djembe/dunun music from W. Africa, there's also a lot of good info. about bala, ngoni, kora and other instruments there. One reason all that shows up on a drum board is that some of the major djembe players who've come to the West are from djeli (griot) families and perform and record with other djelis when possible.

MG, I think you might find some of the posts there very interesting. (Lots of great links to videos that people have dug up, too.)

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Edited to add: I think some recordings (like the Kora Jazz Trio) are a natural result of collaboration between African musicians who've emigrated to western European countries with their new local peers. Why not?

No reason why not. The whole Mandinke big band thing was fuelled musically by the musicians borrowing jazz ideas and techniques and grafting them onto their own songs. That's mostly what the Kora Jazz Trio do - most of the songs are simply different versions of Djeli Moussa Diawara's own songs recorded on his other albums, plus the odd jazz tune.

I like it. But is it good?

How would I know?

MG

[seeline]

Gotcha, MG!

I'm not crazy about a lot of those collaborations, but I think some are arguably much more successful than others.

We keep cross-posting - lots more to talk about, though I think I need to be less quick on the draw in order for the convo to be a bit more coherent.

cheers!

e.

the guy who runs the worldservice blog has some K7s of kora players posted....

Edited January 23, 2010 by seeline

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Does that make sense?

Also, MG... not to be too dogmatic myself, but by "first generation," I'm assuming that you're referring to the first generation of kora-playing djelis who have made recordings?

I also think - fwiw - that it might be a good idea to put this in a slightly larger context, of both djeli instruments (ngoni, balafon, xalam, etc.), of women djelis who have been recorded (like Mah Damba), and more.

I *don't* think that the Western recordings of kora are happening in some kind of isolation, or that they're necessarily separate from the larger context - of recordings made by djelis on other djeli instruments + vox. (Which is definitely a djeli instrument!)

Does that make sense?

Absolutely on both points.

My starting point, which I tried not to lose, was these interrelated families of kora players and the evident differences between the two generations - and between different tendencies within the younger generation. Roy Eldridge was not Dizzy Gillespie's father (I feel sure) (Though Arno was Randy's )

MG

A quick add: http://djembefola.com/board/

Although this board is focused on djembe/dunun music from W. Africa, there's also a lot of good info. about bala, ngoni, kora and other instruments there. One reason all that shows up on a drum board is that some of the major djembe players who've come to the West are from djeli (griot) families and perform and record with other djelis when possible.

MG, I think you might find some of the posts there very interesting. (Lots of great links to videos that people have dug up, too.)

Thanks - dumped into my favourites with scarcely a glance, so greatly do I rely on your taste.

(Where's the smiley for "arselicker"? )

MG

[seeline]

Vice versa (taste), so I need one of those smileys, too.

fwiw, I'm *not* saying that there are tons of K7s of kora players - or of any other djelis, for that matter (playing trad. rep.). but there are some floating around, and hopefully, folks will find more and be able to make them available. My hunch is that the handful of Westerners who are actively studying kora and other djeli instruments are trying to dig them up.

As for the broader Marsalis family analogy, yep - we agree there, too! (Though clearly, there's a difference between djelis, being that the position is hereditary and has lots more to it than learning an instrument, and families who've pursued music - though of course, there are lots of similarlities, too.)

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

MG, with all due respect, you may not have been in the right shops for that, or in places at the right time. (when cassettes of kora players were available.) They do exist, as do older cassette recordings of djelis playing ngoni/xalam/whatever other local name the instrument has.

Well, I have to confess that my trips to West Africa occupied a decade from 1993 to 2002. I'm getting a bit too old to keep on my toes, as you have to in Africa, as you would in the Philly ghetto, for a period of several weeks.

The system in Senegambia (and I've been told that Guinea and Mali use the same system) is that royalties are paid on the number of units manufactured, not the number sold. The copyright offices, which collect the royalties, can establish the former number with some ease, but the latter number disappears into the miasma of the informal economy. So record companies tend to be a bit conservative and, if they don't think they can sell another batch of twenty-five thousand albums (the normal duplication run), the album will suddenly be out of print. So the record shops - and I mean the legit ones, as well as the informal ones - all keep back one copy and use it, after deletion, to copy the album for customers who still want to buy it.

So, if you go into the back rooms of these shops - and of course I spent enough money to be allowed in the back rooms - what you see is a mini history of the music the shop has stocked since it opened. Now, they don't have a Spillers Records that's been open since 1894, but some of these places have been around since the seventies. If you're searching for one specific record, you might have to go to a few. But phew! They're like an Aladdin's cave! (My big find was an album Kine Lam made with Youssou Ndour's band that even Toshiya Endo didn't know about.) But it's mostly modern music. The big exceptions are for Mandinke female vocalists and Wassoulou kamelengoni singers/bands (depending on area).

MG

[A Lark Ascending]

The great thing about threads like this - and can I say how nice it has been to exchange differing viewpoints in such a mutually respectful manner - is it gets you listening out of your current zone of habit. I've had the 2nd volume of the Rail Band retrospective on this evening and its been wonderful. Not directly related to kora playing, but you can see where I'm coming from.

There's a lot in your initial post, MG.

If you were narrowing it down to 5 easily available recordings that give you most pleasure (I'm more interested in music as pleasure) what would you go for?

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

The great thing about threads like this - and can I say how nice it has been to exchange differing viewpoints in such a mutually respectful manner - is it gets you listening out of your current zone of habit. I've had the 2nd volume of the Rail Band retrospective on this evening and its been wonderful. Not directly related to kora playing, but you can see where I'm coming from.

There's a lot in your initial post, MG.

If you were narrowing it down to 5 easily available recordings that give you most pleasure (I'm more interested in music as pleasure) what would you go for?

I must get that Rail Band set.

I assume you mean the kora players.

Amazon UK used £9.78 and worth double. I'm serious about this album. It's "Kind of blue" and "A love supreme" in this field.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mali-Ancient-strings-Various-Artists/dp/B00004XQFY/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1264279149&sr=1-2

Toumani Diabate's first - beautiful music. I really don't care if it's neo-colonial when I'm listening to it. £4.70 used. Or you can get a DL for £2.99. What more could you ask?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Kaira-Toumani-Diabate/dp/B00000061L/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1264279279&sr=1-8

Amadu Bansang Jobarte was in his early seventies when he recorded this.

£14.95 at Amazon

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tabara-Amadu-Bansang-Jobarteh/dp/B000003ISQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1264279626&sr=1-1

Only recording of Sidikiba Diabate - and not strictly a kora album, but fabulous. (Also pricey £17.49)

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lepopee-Mandingue-Kouyate-Sory-Kandia/dp/B000X74RS6/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1264279972&sr=1-4

Well, you can get this, but it's £38.50 used at Amazon. Shove it in your wish list and watch to see if the price comes down.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Yasimika-Jali-Musa-Jawara/dp/B00000061R/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1264280283&sr=1-1

MG

Actually, I think emusic may have the "Epopee du Mandingue" on their site, Bev.

[chitownjazz]

I guess you're in Chicago - so here's one at US AMazon $8.99 used

http://www.amazon.com/Mali-Ancient-Strings-Various-Artists/dp/B000059TAJ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1264263275&sr=1-1

MG

Thanks, I'd had seen that and not looked carefully enough to recognize it as the right one.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

I guess you're in Chicago - so here's one at US AMazon $8.99 used

http://www.amazon.com/Mali-Ancient-Strings-Various-Artists/dp/B000059TAJ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1264263275&sr=1-1

MG

Thanks, I'd had seen that and not looked carefully enough to recognize it as the right one.

Trouble is, the cover's in French and I'd done my listing in English. Very hard to search in the wrong language

MG

[seeline]

Well, I have to confess that my trips to West Africa occupied a decade from 1993 to 2002. I'm getting a bit too old to keep on my toes, as you have to in Africa, as you would in the Philly ghetto, for a period of several weeks.

The system in Senegambia (and I've been told that Guinea and Mali use the same system) is that royalties are paid on the number of units manufactured, not the number sold. The copyright offices, which collect the royalties, can establish the former number with some ease, but the latter number disappears into the miasma of the informal economy. So record companies tend to be a bit conservative and, if they don't think they can sell another batch of twenty-five thousand albums (the normal duplication run), the album will suddenly be out of print. So the record shops - and I mean the legit ones, as well as the informal ones - all keep back one copy and use it, after deletion, to copy the album for customers who still want to buy it.

So, if you go into the back rooms of these shops - and of course I spent enough money to be allowed in the back rooms - what you see is a mini history of the music the shop has stocked since it opened. Now, they don't have a Spillers Records that's been open since 1894, but some of these places have been around since the seventies. If you're searching for one specific record, you might have to go to a few. But phew! They're like an Aladdin's cave! (My big find was an album Kine Lam made with Youssou Ndour's band that even Toshiya Endo didn't know about.) But it's mostly modern music. The big exceptions are for Mandinke female vocalists and Wassoulou kamelengoni singers/bands (depending on area).

This is really helpful (all the info. about royalties, etc.) - and I have to say that i envy you the opportunity to get into those shops' back rooms! The "Aladdin's cave" aspect of them must be sheer delight.

Have you been to either Bamako or Conakry? I have a feeling that you *might* be able to scrounge up some recordings of older jelis and jelimouso in those cities, but who knows... I've been told that Bamako was a record buyers' paradise back in the 70s; that lots and lots of rare LPs (legit pressings) of a plethora of styles were available there that were quite rare in both Europe and the US. (And I'm talking about European and US jazz, blues, etc. LPs, not local K7s.) I bet that a lot of East African coastal cities would have very interesting music on offer, too.

maybe someday I'll get to go...

Re. some of the recordings you recommended above, I think most of them are available on Emusic.com., sans liner notes.

Edited to add: my recent favorites (from Stern's and a few other companies) are retrospectives of Tabu Ley Rochereau's and Franco's careers. While i realize this is a kora thread - and that they're from Congo/Zaire - I thought I'd mention them anyway, as they're well worth picking up. (or dl'ing from emusic.com)

Edited January 23, 2010 by seeline

[A Lark Ascending]

Many thanks for those recs, MG, which I am following up.

The Ancient Strings one doesn't seem to be available for download even though most of the Buda catalogue is on e-music. I've ordered a hard copy plus that cheap download of the Diabate on Amazon. 3 and 4 are currently being sucked off e-music.

I actually have the fifth on LP, though with a different cover. It's a 1986 pressing on Oval - I seem to recall it was really lionised in Folk Roots at the time. Might even have won an award. At the time I played it a few times but didn't get it. Will transfer to CD-R later today.

Enjoyed this last night:

And am now on:

Good to have been reminded of this corner of my collection.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Have you been to either Bamako or Conakry? I have a feeling that you *might* be able to scrounge up some recordings of older jelis and jelimouso in those cities, but who knows... I've been told that Bamako was a record buyers' paradise back in the 70s; that lots and lots of rare LPs (legit pressings) of a plethora of styles were available there that were quite rare in both Europe and the US. (And I'm talking about European and US jazz, blues, etc. LPs, not local K7s.) I bet that a lot of East African coastal cities would have very interesting music on offer, too.

maybe someday I'll get to go...

Never been to Bamako or Conakry, I'm afraid. They were hellishly expensive to get to, compared with Banjul (very cheap flights from here) and Dakar. And there was often some disturbance in the area that put me off.

Do go - and don't wait until it becomes too much of an effort.

MG

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

I actually have the fifth on LP, though with a different cover. It's a 1986 pressing on Oval - I seem to recall it was really lionised in Folk Roots at the time. Might even have won an award. At the time I played it a few times but didn't get it. Will transfer to CD-R later today.

That's the one I have, but on CD. Oval was Charlie Gillette's company. He still has a World Music programme on the BBC World Service. Back in the sixties, he used to write very good pieces on R&B for the Record Mirror.

And am now on:

Good to have been reminded of this corner of my collection.

Funny sleeve, that - it's a pic of a Dogon village, nowt to do with Mandinke music. The Dogon have been in the region a lot longer than the Mandinke and speak a Voltaic language, not a Mande language. I dunno about you, but I find that sort of thing very irritating - though it's not as bad as having Von Freeman's face on the sleeve of a Willis Jackson CD, or Red Nichols' on a Red Allan CD

MG

[A Lark Ascending]

Funny sleeve, that - it's a pic of a Dogon village, nowt to do with Mandinke music. The Dogon have been in the region a lot longer than the Mandinke and speak a Voltaic language, not a Mande language. I dunno about you, but I find that sort of thing very irritating - though it's not as bad as having Von Freeman's face on the sleeve of a Willis Jackson CD, or Red Nichols' on a Red Allan CD

MG

Yes, I know what you mean. I was showing a clip from Andrew Marr's series about the Blitz on Liverpool to a class last week. Couldn't help but express my irritation that the Stuka dive bombers shown would have run out of fuel on such a mission and that the footage probably came from Holland or Poland.

In another age we'd be writing cranky letters to the Radio Times complaining that the steam engine shown on Miss Marple could not possibly have been running in 1936 because....

[John L]

This is one of my favorite records. Haidara is one of the most beautiful and hypnotic pieces of music that I have ever heard.

Thanks for this thread, MG. I have year initial post copied in my music database.

Edited January 24, 2010 by John L

[jeffcrom]

Let me add my thanks for this fascinating thread.

[seeline]

As a bit of a response to some of MG's early posts in this thread (about the larger bands from Guinea and Mali in particular), here's Mande music specialist Eric Charry on the history of Bembeya Jazz. He has a great deal to say about djelis, traditional music, some of the "outside" musical influences that are important for these bands, etc.

From what I know - not nearly as much as people like Graeme Counsel or Charry - Cuban music was super-important for the musicians in these bands, right down to their choices of instrumentation. Recordings of Cuban music were widely sold in Africa via a subsidiary of HMV, and musicians from places as diverse as Cameroon and Kenya talk about how important this music was - still is - for an entire generation of people. (The founders of Bembeya and other bands are part of that generation, so were many who have since passed on - scads of musicians from Congo, the great Cameroonian musicologist/poet/composer/lyricist/performer Francis Bebey, and so many more...)

At any rate, the interview with Charry is just the tip of the iceberg re. resources (including discographies and reviews) to be found at www.afropop.org (web site for NPR's Afropop Worldwide show).

Highly recommended, and - in this case - I'll also plug Charry's book on Mande music.

Banning Eyre's book In Griot Time also covers this ground, though in a non-academic writing way. (I've linked to his site because the book is hard to find elsewhere - it's o.p. and some sellers are asking for absurdly high amounts of money for it...)

Edited January 24, 2010 by seeline

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

I read somewhere years ago that the first pressing plant set up in Africa was in Portuguese Guinea - now Guinea Bissau - in something like 1919.

MG

[mikeweil]

Ancient Strings - Barenreiter Musicaphon (CD Buda Musique) (1970) The prime classic kora album – a work as important in its field as "Kind of blue".

Wow - I didn't know that - I have the old Bärenreiter LP and some more from that series - all beautiful music.

I love Kora - even a modern guy like Foday Musa Suso, whom I saw live two years ago.

During the time I was working regularly with a dance therapist who had spent some time in Africa, we once were approached by a woman who had heard of our workshop - she invited us to her home. It turned out she had been married to an ambassador, had spent many years in Africa (during the Biafra crisis, among others) and had two or three Koras hanging on the wall - and she knew how to play them! That instrument has a beautiful sound, but only in the traditional tunings.

Anyone looking for more info, check out Eric Charry's book on Mande music:

Edited January 24, 2010 by mikeweil

[seeline]

OK, that's two of us hyping Eric Charry! (See my previous post, just before yours...)

Here's the complete table of contents... should whet your appetites,

Edited January 24, 2010 by seeline