Ton's Musical Musings: Better four ngonis than seven koras

If the latest project by a musical hero—kora virtuoso Toumani Diabaté with his La Symphonie de la Kora—was any indication, the future of the traditional music of Mali was looking rather dark. On Diabaté’s latest CD, no less than seven koras (21-string harp-lutes) are plucked simultaneously, seemingly without preconceived plan. Had megalomania replaced the subtlety of previous projects such as Songhai, Djelika and In The Heart Of The Moon, those wonderful duets with the late Ali Farka Touré?

So when Diabaté’s longtime collaborator Bassekou Kouyate released an album with no less than four ngonis (lutes), I didn’t even bother to listen. Granted, four times three to five strings was a far lesser evil than seven times 21, but the prospect was uninviting nevertheless.

During the summer, however, at the Sfinks Festival near Antwerp in Belgium, I was lured to the main stage by snippets of a perform-ance somewhere between waddling Malinese tradition and deliciously squirming funk. And you know what? Behind vocalist Ami Sacko, four gentlemen were vigorously plucking their ngonis. Kouyate and his formation band Ngoni ba were presenting the material from their new CD, Segu Blue.

In contrast to the shoreless babbling of La Symphonie de la Kora, Segu Blue is a paragon of what can be achieved by restraint and clever arrangements. Furthermore, the four ngonis are distinct in character, ranging from soprano to bass in register. Also, Ngoni ba excels in tight ensemble playing.

Bassekou Kouyate’s research into the connections between the blues from the desert and its cousin from the delta doesn’t feature distracting guest performances by American bluesmen in search of their roots, in the way Corey Harris can be seen visiting Ali Farka Touré in the documentary Feel Like Going Home. Despite some tropes imported from overseas, Segu Blue is an African project that opens new routes for the further development of age-old tradition.

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