sahelsounds

Three at a time please.

2010-02-19T15:12:00.006Z

The guitar soiree is the quinessential to the modern Tamashek. At least a few times in a week a festival will be organized -- be it a marriage, a baptism, or simply a concert. As the first stars appear in the sky, the guitar can be heard wafting over the city. "Listen..." heads tilt, to ascertain the sound. "Radio? No, definitely guitar..."

The guests, the women in glittering shawls, the young men in new turbans and sporting leather jackets assemble on the ornate rugs on opposing sides. In the center lies a section a few meters squared. This is the dancefloor. The first group is announced over the microphone to come forward as the band strikes a few chords, and groups of men rush forward. There is usually disagreement, as six young men stubbornly claim their place. "Three people only, please," the announcer begs. The band waits patiently for concession. "Merci," the announcer sighs, and the music begins. There is some bustle in the crowd of women before a few jump up. The dance is a simple two step from side to side, although it occurs on a counter beat, and the dancers dance in place, facing one another yet seperated by a good meter, moving their arms about in striking poses. At some point in the song, the refrain, both sides step forward and and dance close to one another, before passing and changing sides on the square. The music ends, the six dancers rush back to their places.

Group Amanar at a small concert in Essouk. (myspace link)

The guitar soiree is the forum for Tamashek guitar music. It's rather nonparticipatory -- after all, everyone wants to dance -- but it is just as much an opportunity to be seen. The first guitar soirees came in the 1990s. Prior to that the guitar cassettes were more likely to be heard blaring throughout the speakers in Libyan military camps.

In some ways, the precendent of the guitar could be seen as the tahardint, the traditional guitar, and the takamba. The takamba is a style of tahardint with a distinctive rhythm pounded on a calabas. It is a fast sound and paradoxically a painfully slow dance. The format of the soirees are similar, but the dancing is slower, ghostly, and more eloquent.

Takamba from Ali Ag Moman, Timbouctou.

Yet the music that probably comes closest to the guitar is iswatt. Iswatt incidentally is a noninstrumental music. The sound is created by a rhythmic clapping accompanied by foot stomping, a constant low frequency male humming and grunts, and a female singing ("the five instruments of iswatt," a friend proclaims). The crowd forms a circle and pairs of dancers enter admist the energectic hand clapping. The dancing is fast, arms flailing, dust raising, and with billowing robes. The dancers drop to the ground and jump into the air.

If the guitar is the music of ville, isawatt, even today, continues to be a music of the brousse. In the rainy season, a few people will sneak away into the darkness, far away from the tents and begin singing. The others will hear and come together, following the echoes through the dark night. In that way at least, things are not so different.

Iswatt "demonstration" by children en brousse.

Home taping is killing music

2010-01-18T09:53:00.004Z

On a near moonless night, the bus rumbles to a halt. The passengers all debark along the side of the road -- a vast clear plain clouded in by the shadows of the Dogon cliffs -- somewhere on the national highway between Douentza and Hombori. As all the weary passengers sit, they all are pulling out cellphones, and soon the mass is illuminated by little square blue screens. There is no cellular phone reception here -- this is not important. They are not making calls. Rather, what ensues is an orchestra of tinny digital audio, a menagerie of sound, beamed out like starlight over the plain.

Douentza recording

The cellular phone in its current incarnation is a recent phenomena here, but one with sweeping effects. In the past few years, the market was flooded with cheaply designed Chinese cellphones (bearing names like Samsong or Sqny), equipped with memory cards and featuring Video, Photo, and Audio, as well as Bluetooth wireless transfer. The ability to make calls is rather superflous, and they are likely distributed in villages that have no cellular access whatesoever.

Interview with Amadou, chaffeur

One of the repercussions is the death of the cassette. For a long time, the cassette has held sway as the primary audio device in the Sahel and Sahara. While vinyl was popular in the capitals, in the radio stations, it never gained mass distribution -- the simple environmental considerations would render it useless after a single hot season. As are CDs, quickly destroyed by the degenerative effects of dust and sand. The hardy cassette was the chosen media for the desert. But now, it seems they are breathing their last breath. Original cassettes are plummeting. While pirate cassette vendors are still a mainstay in every market, their compilations are not recorded from studio produced originals, but dubbed from mp3 to tape recorders.

Interview with Mouda Maiga, cassette vendor

The amateur recordings on cellphones are the envy of any ethnomusicologist -- Tamashek poetry, tende drumming, multiphonic issawad chanting. All, in fact, done without the chasm the foreigner, an outsider whose motives are questioned and ability to understand hampered by culture and language. The ethnomusicologist cannot ignore the effect of the cellular phone, nor the utility that it plays in research.

Interview regarding the Christian Tamashek guitar of Pastor Mohammed, from Timbouctou, conducted over cellular phone recording.

The new media places the technology in the hands of the Africans. And as such, questions the role of the intrepid collector, the documentarist, the anthropologist, the photographer. The foreigner who has descended onto the continent over the past centuries has benefited from the technological inequity to become the voice, the conduit. Like the cassette, his days are numbered.

'Mashup' of assorted music collected from cellphones in Gao and Kidal.

Festival Roundup

2009-12-07T16:20:00.001Z

It's the end of the year. Festival time! For some odd reason, the Sahara likes to cram its festivals on top of one another, back to back, at the coldest time of the year. Make sure you bring a warm coat and mittens. Many of the festivals have important cultural and social objectives -- see the attached links for more information. Hopefully this year will find a good amount of foreign visitors, not scared of by a few unfortunate but isolated security incidents. But as a friend told me: "We don't need tourists to have a good time." The party continues as planned.

Fete du Chameau (Camel Festival)
Tessalit, Kidal Circle, Mali
December 29th, 30th, and 31st, 2009
A lesser known festival, probably due it's locality (deep in Azawad, near the Algerian border). Expect camel races and music from Tinariwen.
http://www.feteduchameau.webs.com/

The Saharan Nights of Essouk
Essouk, Kidal Circle, Mali
January 2nd, 3rd and 4th, 2010
"The Essouk festival is a three-day celebration of music and culture, aimed largely at a local audience of nomads, but also at festivalgoers from other parts of Mali, Africa and the world."
*due to financial reasons, this has been shifted to Feb. or March - stay tuned.*
http://www.keltinariwen.org/UK/1-presentation-festival.html

Festival au Desert
Essakane, Timbouctou Circle, Mali
January 7th, 8th, 9th
The large and well known international festival, hosting over 30 music groups. Everyone who's anyone from Mali and W. Africa -- Tinariwen, Amadou and Mariam, Afel Boucoum, Vivian N'dour, Dimi Mint Abba -- and quite a few from abroad as well. A special anniversary, celebrating its 10th year.
http://www.festival-au-desert.org/

Festival Tamasonghoi
Bourem, Gao Circle, Mali
January 12th, 13th, and 14th 2010
A new festival, in its debut year. A long list of artists, both Tamashek and Songhai, including Etran Finatawa, Tamikrest, Kanna, Atia, Douma, Amanar, and Azawagh.
http://festivaltamasonghoibourem.unblog.fr/

That ain't workin', that's the way you do it...

2009-12-02T11:05:00.001Z

The Tuaregs consist of a variety of tribes, stretching across the center of the Saharan desert, East of Mauritania, across Mali, Algeria, Niger, Libya. In the past, the Western association was with "blue men" in the desert, the fierce resistance to colonization, the romantic myth of the desert nomad. Today it is impossible for the West to speak of Tuareg without the obligatory reference to the Tuareg guitar.

Koma and Attaye, two acoustic guitars in Kidal

The Tamashek guitar, or "ishumar" (A French deriviation of chômeur, or "unemployed") was borne in the rebellion. After the first rebellion, the youth that had left for Libya for military training in the war with Chad returned to Mali -- without any education or opportunity.

Interview with Initriy and Tahieat (French)

Origins are difficult to ascertain, but Tinariwen of Tessalit, Mali are popularly considered the pioneers. The music of Tinariwen is traded across Mali, via the Tamashek. Numbering only 600,000 but stretching over thousands of kilometers -- the Malian Tamashek community is like a small town, and everyone knows everyone. But the heart is definitely in the North of the country.

Ishumar guitar music is preferrably played with the electric guitar (for its responsive touch, both solo and rhythm) bass, percussion (calabas, djembe, or drum kit), and singing and hand claps. It is almost always played in a pentatonic scale (familiar immediately for the "blues" component), with a droning bass note and syncopated treble that accompanies the singing. One chord is often sufficient. but with tremolos and impressive solos. A friend remarks that tremolo of "false" notes are what seperate Tamashek guitar from Sonrai guitar. "It plays better with the way they speak." And certaintly, the language Tamashek is full of bent and uluated vowels, placing it closer to Arabic in sound then with its cousins to the South. While the music has certain roots in traditional Tamashek guitar, the influence of Western music (cassettes of Bob Marley and Jimmy Hendrix most substantially) cannot be ignored. And today, as is common throughout the Sahara, the favorite guitarist amongst the younger generation: Dire Straits.

Talking with a former rebel/musician: "Dire Straits is the number one guitarist for the Tamashek. If he held a concert here...no...all the Tuareg - Algeria, Libya, Niger - would come to Kidal." Mark Knopfler, are you listening?

Abba and Ahmedou Ag with acoustic guitar, Timbouctuo, 2, 3,

Sarid Ag and Doni with electric guitar, Kidal, 2

Sonrai sound

2009-11-20T16:24:00.002Z

En route to Timbouctou, I stop over in Goundam, a nondescript village of the Niger Delta. As I travel with guitar, a young man stops me and asks if he can have a look in the case. "Moi, aussi, je suis un artiste..." His name is Babah Dire (from the town Dire), a recorded artist with a few cassettes and a regular at Essakane, and I shoot the preceding video.

The style of guitar is that which is popularized by Ali Farka Toure; what can be called the Sonrai (or Songhai) folk.* Notably for it's blues sound, the ever present pentatonic scale, and strong punctuated notes (there are none of the tremolos or false notes as in Tamashek guitar). But it would be difficult to pigeonhole the music. Authenticity is for idealists.

Outside "Obama's" botique in Niafounke, a guitarist demonstrates the Sonrai folklore.

Souleyman - Ali Farka Cover

Souleyman - A song in the Bambara scale

The village of Tonka lies between Niafounke and Timbouctou, on the bank of the River Niger. It is an exceptionally green place, and exudes a certain friendliness which maybe has something to do with lack of tourism. I spend a few days with a group called Horostar de Tonka, three chauffeurs who when they're not crisscrossing Northern Mali, retreat to the edge of town and play guitar until the late dark hours (there is no electricity in Tonka, a missed blessing?).

Horostar de Tonka - Chaud!

Alkibar Gignor of Niafounke (previously here) produces a funky interpretation of Sonrai guitar. The following tracks are from a night rehearsal at the Ali Farka Hotel - including lots of dancing, which the microphone may have failed to capture. Imagination required.

Alkibar Gignor 1

Alkibar Gignor 2

Alkibar Gignor 3

* In local usage, Sonrai refers to the language/culture in Timbouctou and its environs, Songhai for Gao.

Mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be Griots.

2009-11-08T17:02:00.007Z

While Tuareg rock (Desert Blues, i.e. Tinariwen) is the most known form of Tamashek music abroad, traditional guitar still has a strong place in the North. The traditional guitar is found throughout West Africa, for Peuls, Sonrai, Maures, Tuareg, Sarakoles - respectively named Hodou, Koubour, Tidinit, Teherdent or Hardine (and a four stringed version known as Gambare or Jeli Ngoni for the Bambara).

There are two sizes of the guitar; both are the same form - a three stringed lute of wood hollow body. The guitar is fretless, and the strings are bound to the neck by a wrapped bands of elastic. The larger, with a deeper resonance, is used for "listening" while the smaller, with a brighter and tinnier sound embodies a more lively sound, suitable for dancing. Amplification is achieved with the standard microphone of West Africa - a transducer microphone furnished from the Casio watch. The guitarist sits with a knee bent the guitar held between the legs, a seemingly acrobatic position (photo needed!).

Ali Ag Mooman is a griot from Timbouctou. While the griots still hold a strong role in society (no marriage would be possible without one), they are often marginalized in the market. The traditional music is not sought after with the fervor as the modern sounds.

Ali plays some songs while his brother explains (in French, translations below).

Adernibah

"This is in the desert, there is a group of guitarists that had lost their route, and they played this song for 20 days. Adernibah in Tamashek is people who are lost in the desert. It is a song known in the entire world."

Two Songs

"This is the first song of the Tuareg. It's called "Yona". The beginning of the (Tuareg) guitar, this is it!"

Takoba

"This is from a grand leader, called Hawadine."

Hawadi

"This is called y'addi. This is the song uniquely for the Tuareg. If there is a war, this song is played. It's like a drug, this song, and if they hear it they march straight!"

Lastly, a recording of Ali Ag Mooma (thardint), Moussa (Calabass), and myself (guitar) in an evening soiree/cassette recording, performed at his house by the "Gare Goundam." As the night progresses, all the neighbors trickle in, drawn by the buzzing of the guitar - the best promotion, and how most soirees are "advertised" in the desert towns and the nomad 'acampaments.'

This is a popular song titled Chebibah, which means "the youth" in Arabic. It was originally composed by an Algerian, but is a standard for Tamashek guitar.

Chebibah

Sing me a song!

2009-10-14T16:01:00.004Z

Girl by the rice paddies

A French song

Girl by the market with Amadou and Mariam's Homage to Ali Farka Toure

Girl in Niafounke tries to remember the words

Girl with mother singing Na Hawa Doumbia

Hamadou Traore singing song from the Bi-annal, National Orchestra of Timbouctou

Kids with the Mali National Anthem (sort of French)

Mamadou Boucom with religious chant (Arabic)

Two boys in Timbouctou with 'caravan song' (Tamasheq)

Orchestre Dental, the music video

2009-10-05T16:38:00.001Z

Group Dental (previously) from Nouakchott, is one of the most interesting bands I've had the chance to record and definitely the most unique. The music is distinctly modern, but incorporating a broad range of influences from the traditional scales of the Sahara (Moor, Peul, Soninke) to the imported sounds of their youth (Hendrix, Marley).

Ross from SonicAfrica was in Nouakchott last spring, and shot this video of a rehearsal:

The name of this song is Onakhara, which means "let's learn" . Baabi Sarr sing this song in soninke , and in this song he encourages Mauritanias people to learn their native languages.

Gnawa, across the desert

2009-09-29T10:47:00.000Z

They said 'we behold you as one diligent in your pursuit of much journeying,
On the earth. For a while you stay, and then you journey on your way.'
I said, 'Were there no benefit to be gained in travelling,
The sun would not change its stations in its heavenly mansions.'

- Al-Tadili recording story of Abu Yahya Abu Bakr b. Mahyu al-Sanhaji

Soudani yalah alah, soudani
Soudani yalah alah, soudani yalah
Soudani ya legnawi soudani
Soudani dawi hali soudani

Soudani - Pigeons du Sable

The Sahara is classically viewed as an impenetrable barrier between North and Central Africa. Classically, or perhaps metaphorically, because it is clearly not the case, and the influences that swept across the sand worked both ways, following the routes of the caravans. Perhaps in no other place is this so evident as in the Saharan music, or that on the edges of the desert, such as the Gnawa (or Gnaoua) music of Southern Morocco.

The Gnawa music possesses a droning rhythm from a luth (haj-hooj), clapping, hand cymbals (krakeb), and the typic call and response singing prevalent. It is not unfair to say the music differs widely from that normally identified as "Moroccan" - and is at once more identifiable with Sonrai (or Songhai) of Northern Mali.

The preceding song was recorded in a village Khamlia (known locally as the "village of the blacks"), 7km south of Merzouga and near the ancient caravan town of Sijilmassa.

*note: due to a short stint in France, the website hasn't been updated, but i'm currently back in Northern Mali and will updating with renewed frequency as internet permits!*

Lere

2009-08-20T02:31:00.000Z

In Lere, Mohamed Issa, from the group Tartit, arrives on the tail of a duststorm. He is here for one night, and then departing to play in a marriage "en brouse". Accompanied by myself and Abou, a young apprentice, we play out by the tent until the early hours.

Mohammad Issa Solo

Mohammad Issa Solo 2

(I should note, for aspiring guitarists - often in the Tuareg and Sori guitar, the first string is tuned up to G, and plays the continuous bass)

jam 1

jam 2

jam 3

The next day, before the dust storm tears through the down, I ask the kids to play some songs. I sing a few too - lots of requests for Akon. Heads are appearing over the wall, and by the time the mother comes home, there's a regular concert crowd gathered.

Lere 1

Lere 2

A million and one stars

2009-07-29T10:49:00.001Z

The desert north of the river Niger is a scrubby dry place. Along the border with Mauritanian and Mali, there are a mixture of Maurs, Berbiche, and Tamashek (Tuareg). I meet a group of Kalashnikov carrying youths (military). The zone is in a state of continuous tension, as rebel raids have been frequent and recent as a few months ago. There is a clear division between the Bambara and the Tamashek officers, even though this is likely to be denied.

Ag Said singing independence songs in the truck

I stay a few days in Gargando, a tiny and unassuming village, known in the region primarily for it's brackish water. The youth have come back for vacation. In the late evening, we sit around and play songs on my guitar.

Night Soiree with youth

Night Soiree 2

Night Soiree 3

During the day, the heat is too oppressive to move. Later, by the afternoon, there is millet to pound and cows to feed. But there is lot of time to sit around too and play with the microphone.

Young girl raps (in tamashek)

Unknown song

At night, under the stars, the old bearded patriarch Abdullahi tells me, in a deep cinematic voice: "In America you sleep in five star hotels. Here in the desert, we have a million and one." And his laugh bellows out over the white sand.

The end of the world...

2009-07-07T03:00:00.006Z

I've come to Timbouctou to find a Tamashek guitarist named "Aba". He is from Gargando, and has left music and joined the military. I don't find him. However, I do meet with Mohamed Ag Abothy (or Mohamed "Bidega") who plays the bidega, a semispherical wood instrument with attached pieces of steel. Mohamed claims this is a Tamashek instrument (his father made it, his father before him, etc.), but the sound is similar to that found further south - perhaps influenced by the Mande sound?

Bidega 1

Bocar Tandina is a guitarist who plays in the traditional "Sori" style (think Ali Farka Toure). Along with Mohammad (and a percussionist), they make up the group Fafadoby.

Bocar on guitar

Lastly, a street field recording, walking through the old center of Timbouctou (crying children, an agitated drum session, music drifting from a radio...and motorbikes!

Old town

Legacy of Toure

2009-06-27T15:25:00.004Z

The town of Niafounke is alongside the Niger River in Northern Mali. It is notably famous for being the birthplace of Ali Farka Toure, and the tradition of music continues here. The town itself is mostly Songhai (or Sonrai), and the music that we associate with the North, the drumming guitar bass and double octave, the Malian "blues" as it may be - are mostly a variation of the Songhai sound. Whether or not the origin is here, or, as some claim, in the Soninke region of Kayes, the sound is distinct and recognizable.

Alkibar Gignor is a band composed of family and apprentices of Afel Bocoum (another grand guitarist hailing from Niafounke). I'm not in the habit of taking videos, but below is a recording of the rehearsal, recorded at Toure's family hotel.

Ali Farka Homage

Sahl with Ndarka

Lastly, some recordings of children songs and games. In a typically twist of fate, I was surrounded by thirty or so children who without any prompting, jumped into an exhibition of song. Most of the songs are accompanied by dance and great call and response (see "coonicami"). As far as I can attest, all the songs are in Sonrai - I wish I had more to say, but I'll let them speak for themselves.

Sori Girl

Sori Kids Dance

Coonicami

update: the above song is actually in Bambara. the recorded verses go something like this - "a man is a lion, if his woman tries to be a lion, he'll smack her. when a man talks to his woman, she needs to respond, or he'll smack her."

Another Song

Stomp

The Isle of Morfil

2009-06-15T10:43:00.000Z

Along the border of Senegal and Maurtianian, one finds the ancient kingdom of Fouta Toro - meandering rivers and wide floodplains, covered in scrubby forest and dust, and occasional green patches of irrigated rice and millet. The Isle of Morfil, named for the elephants which have long since vanished, lies in the plane; technically Senegal; but identified as Fouta.

Fouta Toro is old and complex in character. Myths and magic abound, castes and tradition stand strong against the onslaught of outward influence, predating the French colonialism, the Wolof language, even the Islamic invasion. In fact, it was from the Isle of Morfil that the Tekrur empire, joined with the Almoravids, marched upwards and onwards conquering the Iberian Peninsula.

The traditional music of Fouta is based on the Hoddu; but many traditional 'universal' songs have been adapted to the guitar.

Tidiane playing Douga

Tidiane playing Fanta

Group Lewlewal de Podor (Baye Aly N'Diongue, Tidiane Thiam, Demba Doka Barry) rehearses daily next to the barber shop in Podor. They play traditional folk music, but incorporate modern elements; the songs are in Wolof and Pulaar.

Group Lewlewal with Touba

Group Lewlewal with Tara (traditional)

Traditional Pulaar literature is oral - stories often being sung. One of the more interesting forms of literature is that of Pekane. The Pekane is performed solely by the cubaalo or fisherman caste, and in its variety of forms can be used to tell a story, poetry, geneaology, or the more mysterious incantation, to speak and call forth fish. The little village of Ngoulé is a few kilometers from Podor - but it's here that one of the most famous legends of Fouta is based, Seeku Balli and his battle with the Crocodile Ngari Ngoulé.

The story of Seeku Bali, as performed by Ngari Ngaoule and Souleyman Sarr

Ngaoule is a beautiful mystic place. Like the combination of Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel and a Japanese Ronin folk tale. When I arrive on donkey cart, I make directly for the river. The bank is lined with green mango trees, and a few people in the distance are bathing or washing or pushing out on their pirogues. If you listen closely you can hear a bird in the tree. And a mango drop.

Ngaoule

Desert's Guitars

2009-05-08T11:33:00.008Z

Moudou ould Mattalla is Chinguetti's most well known musician. Originally from Zourate, on the border with Algeria, he lives in the village and shares his knowledge with whoever is passing through. He released a CD that is sold in France, that was recorded in his home. In his "music room," the walls are literally covered with pen markings, the different tunings and scales corresponding to each mode of Mauritanian music.

Moudou demonstrating the mode Al-Lebait

Collaborative jam session with a drum machine

Improvisation over Ali Farka Toure song

Modou playing in soiree

Ambient recordings from a party

Ahmed Imbend is a talented self taught musician. "My first guitar, I made when I was a kid. It had one string. Eventually, I got bored, and added another string. I just kept adding strings."

Today, he plays an old student sized Spanish guitar. In the typical DIY fashion, one of the strings is made from a bicycle cable, the transducer pickup is from a telephone, and the amplifier is a stereo with it's leads spliced. He plays with an alternate tuning (E-Ab-Db-E-Ab-Db) that owes a great deal to the tidnit.

Ahmed with homemade "jagwa"

Ahmed "blues"

Ahmed chinguetti song

modified pickup

riff with tapping

Lastly, at an Auberge in the old city across the wadi, a woman's group is assembled and singing for a group of French tourists.

Traditional Moor song

Unidentified chant

Chinguetti; Part One

2009-04-20T18:24:00.009Z

A small town in the rugged interior of Mauritania, an ancient site renowned for its libraries and a caravan trading town for wellover a thousand years.

Ambient recording

Nearly every night, one can hear a distant drumming and chanting. I stumble out in the dark to discover the source. In a crumbling courtyard across the wadi in the old section of town, fifteen men are gathered. This is called "Medh" - or chanting for the Prophet Mohammed. Two men are leading the songs, but everyone is joined in the chanting. There are a few woman present, and the occassionally join in with the shrill cry as they mingle in the background, preparing tea. In Chinguetti, this occurs almost every night, and I am to understand that it is performed exclusively by the "black" Moor.

Medh from a distance

Medh 1

Medh 2

One afternoon I meet with Mama Dimi Mint, a performer in Moudou ould Mattalla group. I come along with the guitar, and bring a trail of children with me. On the tapi (straw mat), a mass of children, boys and girls at their respective sides, play tbal (a shallow drum that looks like a bowl covered with a skin), clap, sing, and bang on whatever else they can find.

Mama Dimi Mint and kids 1

Mama Dimi Mint and kids 2

Mama Dimi Mint and kids 3

2009-03-16T09:48:00.005Z

The Peuls are group of historically pastoral people stretching from the Senegal to Cameroon. But the Pulaar culture in Mauritanian is distinctly that of the Senegalese River that defines the border between the two countries. The music of "le fleuve" has been commercially popularized by Baba Maal, and he has no doubt aided to it's survival and repitition.

Sall is a folk guitarist - a true folk guitarist. He has no interest in playing concerts, but will gladly pick up the guitar in his salon in the "African quarter" as the array of toddlers wander in and out. He's often joined in song with his wife, Kumba, or his children, if they can be coersced to sing along. Notice crying infants, bleating goats, and clanking tea glasses (all integral to Mauritanian recordings).

Sall explains the "base" of Peul folk music

Sall with family

Sall and Kumba

Abderahmane Amdou Ba, also known as Daarorgal Fulbe, Pulaar griot, sings in a rehearsal here with backing guitar of Baby (pronounced Bah-bi) Sall and Jawara, of the group Dentaal, accompanied by the jazz trumpet of Leon Nade, the director of the new music school here in Nouakchott.

Daarorgal Fulbe

Finally, in the spirit of field recordings...a nighttime walk through Cinquieme.

Cinquieme at night

a history of hip hop

2009-02-28T13:18:00.007Z

It's late night, and the crackling radio is broadcasting a Wolof griot.

griot

Next, an excerpt from an interview I conducted with a young rapper from Cinquieme. He talks about the obstacles to music, government supression, lack of resources and financial support for the arts. Following, is an acapella rap in Pulaar and Hassaniya with an explanation.

(brief translation of rap: "i say, that in this country there are many problems, no organization, we don't have any solidarity between the white...the first verse is in pulaar, the second is in hassaniya...the refrain says that while many rappers are making music just to attract some , i'm making rap to speak the truth, all the time, just until the end of time...")

interview with abu

abu's rap and explanation

Talking with an older, traditional Pulaar folk musician, Daarorgal Fulbe, I pose the question as to what he thinks about the youth today making rap music. His reply, in French, is interesting:

("It's now that rap music has come...but it's existed for a long time. A very long time. Me, when I was 4 or 5, with my older brother who rapped. If I sing in Pulaar you'll understand......Is that rap? So actually, rap just modernized, but it's been here a long time...")

Daarogal Fulbe on rap

In conclusion, two Mauritanian tracks copied from a bootleg CD purchased in Cinquieme.

Diamen Tekky (with Noura Mint Seymali

RJ

that old hassaniya sound

2009-02-03T11:12:00.008Z

One of the premiere music venues in a country that otherwise does little to support the arts is the French Cultural Center(CCF). Aristocrats and expats mingle (is there any difference?) in a distinctively non-Mauritanian ambiance. Noura Mint Seymaly plays a set of "modern" Hassaniya music.

Noura Mint Seymaly - traditional
Noura Mint Seymaly - get on the floor!

Crosby is a Malian guitarist in Nouakchott, one of the fixtures of well known musicians, a group of the first modern band, notable for his dark sunglasses of which he always is wearing a pair. Along with a few other aging musicians, most every young guitarist learned from him. I ask him here to show me some of the Hassaniya scales.

Crosby

2009-01-26T10:09:00.004Z

First recording, from a BOB (Brothers of Blood) concert. B.O.B. is a Mauritania hip hop group that now lives in France. They arrived to a screaming crowd at this homecoming gig.

B.O.B. Concert

Ibrahim Boucoum, Malian guitarist in Sekou's studio does a bit of "griot" improvisation, a "freestyle" (in french). He asks my name and then proceeds to sing about myself and America and Obama (you don't need to speak French to understand that much). He is joined part way through by "Nasty", an R&B singer.

Mali Guitar 1

Mali Guitar 2

Abdoul "Baby" Sarr is one of the greater guitarists in Nouakchott. I visit him with his band via an introduction through a friend. Most of the group has been playing for some time, 30 years plus, notably Baby and his friend Jawara (the soloist). The three guitarists and percussionist play a few songs in Soninke, Pulaar, and Hassaniya (listen for the breakdown in the first track), a mixture of Reggae, Funk, and traditional sound.

Group Dental - Sida

Group Dental - Duty

Finally, a rehearsal session for an upcoming concert. The band is led by Sidi Baba, the singer, a flamboyant reggae rockstar, joined by myself and Boucar on the guitar and Khadim on Djembe. This track uses a traditional Pulaar folk song, but much of Sidi's music is strongly influenced by Baye Fall, one of the Marabout brotherhoods in Senegal.

Rehearsal with Sidi Baba

live from nouakchott

2009-01-19T10:11:00.002Z

A recording from a practice session of an upcoming concert here in Nouakchott. I'm playing some sparse guitar accompaniment with two musicians from Senegal, Sidi Baba and Khadim, who sing and play the Djembe respectively.

hayo

Omar's shop in Cinquieme, the kids are playing some game, singing a song.

kids

Salif plays a production he's made on his computer, a fusion of hip hop and traditional Pulaar folk guitar.

salif

Outside Sekou's studio, a Baye Fall group, followers of one of the Senegal brotherhoods pass by, drumming, collecting alms.

bayfal

2009-01-17T15:03:00.002Z

A wedding in cinquieme, held under a tent, in one of the numerous sand courtyards in the neighborhood. You can't not be a spectator. There is an electric guitar and a dozen hand drums, as well as a griot singer.

soninke wedding

Later that night, the wedding moves indoors. I stand out in the darkness outside the mosque to take a recording from over the wall.

drums

Salif is a Pulaar folk musician; guitar student and instructor. He has a hair salon seperated by a sheet from the tailor next door.

pulaar folk

Sekou and Cos2Cos have a recording studio. It is also a haircutting salon and cell phone repair shop. Cos2Cos puts together a reggaeton track, and Abid, a rapper from the Central African Republic stops by for an impromptu improvisation.

studio recording

At sunset in the marche capital - Hassiniya music blares from the cassette shop nearby while the cars fight their way through the gridlock.

sunset

2009-01-14T12:24:00.001Z

in cinquieme, i usually wake to this prayer call from the mosque next door. it's in soninke, one of the small languages spoken in the region, and is one of the first prayer calls i've heard with a woman's voice. sometimes is goes on for fifteen minutes or so, but it's soft and nice to wake to, even at four in the morning.

prayer call