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appeared in an Afrocentric multimedia work BEST ALBUMS in Vienna, Wati, which was directed by opera Mouneissa maverick Peter Sellars and part of Mozart’s (Label Bleu, 1998) 250th birthday celebrations. Acclaimed for its fresh take Sellars would go on to helm Desdemona, a on Malian music – a play by Nobel-Prize-winning novelist Toni first-time pairing of, say, a balaba, the large of her region, with Morrison that reimagined Shakespeare’s the ngoni – and for that controlled, bell-like Othello. Rokia portrayed Barbary, Desdemona’s voice. Folky, bold and graceful. nurse, singing songs derived in part from the Sundiata Epic, the foundation poem of the Wanita Empire. “We were redressing the balance: (Indigo/Label Bleu, 2000) Entirely written and giving a history and background to Othello and arranged by Rokia, this is all telling the story of the play’s female understated elegance, characters,” she says. “Toni [Morrison] gives melodic hooks, lush harmonies and hushed words to those who were not allowed to speak.” atmospherics. !e likes of ‘Souba’, a track Rokia’s Pan-Africanism and forward inspired by an Indian raga, hints at the experiments to come. Reviewed in #6. thinking dovetailed with that of Morrison, who “transformed” a set of Rokia-penned Bowmboï English lyrics on Né So (Home), her latest (Nonesuch, 2003) album, which is concerned with notions of Featuring contributions from refuge, home and respect: “There are so many Kronos Quartet and drawing comparisons with trailblazers things happening now that are related to the such as Björk, Bowmboï scooped Album of the fact we have forgotten what respect is. To Year at the BBC Radio 3 Awards for World ourselves, to others, to the world.” Music. ‘Mariama’, an intense duet with the Rokia is adamant that arts and culture will singer Ousmane Sacko, is a highlight. A Top of transform her beleaguered, beloved Mali the World review in #21. (“The rest of the world has been giving us food Tchamantché and aid since independence [from France in (2008, Nonesuch) 1960] and nothing has changed; it’s getting An album that throws a pop worse”). And culture, she says, is about rhythm section and beat boxer in among African and Western Photos by Danny Willems Danny by Photos education, and letting people know their own classical instrumentation, and sees Rokia merit. In 2009 she established the award- strapping on a Gretsch guitar for a blues rock winning Fondation Passerelle (The Footbridge sound. A Top of the World review in #55, it Foundation), a Bamako-based school that clinched her the Best Artist gong at the trains young musicians outside the inaugural Songlines Music Awards. system, encouraging professional careers. Beautiful Africa She’s as much a woman of action, then, as is (Nonesuch, 2013) she of thoughts and words. In 2014 her work !is superbly cra"ed work is Muddy Waters) and in the cassettes passed especially on a profession in which struggle with the UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, took held to be Rokia’s finest. down by an elder brother: Dire Straits, Pink and penury were the norm. Thankfully, the her to Goudoubo Camp in Burkina Faso, host Produced by John Parish (PJ Floyd, a zillion hip-hop acts. She sang, too, patronage of the late great Ali Farka Touré to some 10,000 Malian refugees who fled the Harvey, Tracey Chapman), it’s an unabashedly Rokia Traoré rock-oriented yet still distinctly African and unusually for a West African woman, transformed her: “He told me don’t try and conflict in the country’s north. “There are still record, with ngoni ri#s on a par with guitars. It The Malian singer-songwriter continues to push played guitar; aged 18 she raised the hackles play like anyone else. Like me, he was a self- 167,000 Malian refugees between Burkina Faso, pulses with anger over the chaos in Mali the boundaries with her choice of collaborators and of Mali’s instrumental fraternity by learner. He said ‘You’re on your own path.’” Mauritania and Niger,” says Rokia. “The crisis before delivering a stunning paean to the appearing, with guitar, on Malian TV. Rokia set about creating a body of uniquely is a forgotten one. I came to hear their stories. I Motherland. A Top of the World in #91. producers. Jane Cornwell reflects on her work to date “I am sure all that early travelling changed modern West African music, sung in French came to ask for peace. The rest of humanity my personality,” says Rokia, who’s based and her native Bamana (English-language cannot allow for this to carry on.” IF YOU LIKE ROKIA between Brussels and Bamako. “I went to songs would come later), and set to Né So’s spare, powerful title-track offers TRAORÉ, THEN TRY… he daughter of a jazz-loving diplomat Over the course of six albums, along with school in different countries, experienced instruments including the balafon, a timely reminder. ‘Home, I’m going who moved from Mali to the Middle multi-media pieces, an African-take on different cultures and listened to different and that sharp-edged lute, the ngoni. In home,’ she sings and Namvula Shiwezwa TEast, North Africa and Belgium, Shakespeare and a seat on the 2015 Cannes music. I was encouraged to be independent and 1997 she won the RFI’s (Radio sometimes, (Namvula, 2014) Rokia Traoré has never been a traditionalist. Film Festival jury, this willowy, crop-haired open-minded. It gave me the ability to do the France Internationale) prize whispers. ‘So Namvula Rennie was born in !e title-track from her acclaimed 2013 mother-of-two has reinforced her reputation music I do and think that anything is possible.” for African Discovery of many wars, so Zambia of mixed Zambian- album Beautiful Africa (a Top of the World as an artistic intellectual. She’s also a Having studied sociology at a lycée in the Year, lending traction many victims... So Scottish parents; this debut in #91) sees her strapping on an electric musician who loves to rock out. Bamako, she was discouraged by friends and to her 1998 debut, much sadness, so references everything from traditional Zambian rhythms to Scottish folk and Gretsch guitar to sing of the chaos in Mali One of six children, Rokia was born in 1974 family from becoming a singer. Not because Mouneissa, which sold 40,000 much confusion… elements of jazz and Latin. Original songs are and elsewhere in Africa, and of her faith in in Kolokani, north-west Mali. All that moving she wasn’t born a griot, the storytellers who copies in Europe. She went on to So much hope.’ li"ed by breezy lyrics sung in English, French, wisdom and peace. ‘In my Afro-progressive from place to place meant she felt dislocated; have preserve Malian traditions for centuries, break more boundaries by Portuguese and Lenje. Reviewed in #105. veins burns Bambara blood infused with hope,’ she found solace in her parents’ vinyl but because her parents’ elite circle was aghast collaborating with Kronos + ALBUM Né So, is she cries in her sweet, powerful voice. collection (Serge Gainsbourg, Billie Holiday, that she’d throw away her formal education, Quartet, and in 2006 reviewed in this issue, p51

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