Search - Kasse Mady Diabate :: Kiriké

The new album Kiriké has provided a platform for Kassé Mady to celebrate his position as one of Mali's greatest voices in distinguished company. The album is the third in a series born out of the friendship between the young Malian kora maestro Ballaké Sissoko and the iconoclastic French cellist Vincent Segal. Already this friendship has resulted in two beautiful albums, Chamber Music (2009) and its follow-up At Peace (2012), both released on the No Format! label. Kirike, like the other two albums in the series, exemplifies a more intimate musical current that has been emerging in Bamako, one that's closer to the acoustic sound of tradition. Having long been admirers of Kassé Mady, Ballaké and Vincent dreamt of assembling a royal cast around him and making an album worthy of his extraordinary voice. So it was that three virtuoso soloists came together, childhood friends, one-time members of the National Instrumental Ensemble of Mali, and scions of Mali's great griot dynasties. Ballaké Sissoko is the son of Djelimady Sissoko, the musical giant who recorded the album Ancient Strings, a cornerstone of modern kora music. Balafon player Lansiné Kouyaté is the son of Siramori Diabaté. (and so related to Kassé Mady). And ngoni player Makan Tounkara, aka Badié , grew up in the heart of the Instrumental Ensemble, his father being one of its directors. The centrepiece is Kassé Mady's voice. He sings in Bambara, the dominant language of southern Mali, and in doing so the man with the voice of velvet reveals an altogether different personality: an old man of the soil grumbling at the margins of his field in a language infinitely rootsier and more flavoursome than the grand Malinké of the classic griot praise-songs. A fifty-year long career hasn't blunted his high-notes, but rather added richness to the astonishing gentleness of his baritone, making his voice better suited to this chamber music than to the brilliant sheen of fusionistic pop. It is a sound attuned to the modern ear, a consecration of one of Mali's greatest voices.
Kassé Mady Diabaté vocals
Makan Badgé Tounkara ngoni
Lansine Kouyate balafon
Ballaké Sissoko kora
Vincent Segal cello
Produced by Vincent Segal