Urban art in Bamako with Drissa Konaté who shows us his own depiction of everyday life in the Malian capital. His series of paintings gives us an overview of the day to day reality in this big city using the “somatra” as a main instrument. “Sotramas” are these small green vans used as public transport in Bamako. Travelling in one of them is a must-have experience to truly get to know the city; very much like travelling Venice aboard a gondola even though traffic and the heat can make the experience slightly different.
Bamakosmos II - Idrissa Diabaté, Maimouna Doumbia & Yannick Nolting
Griot musician Idrissa Diabaté (kora) and his wife Maimouna Doumbia (voice, together with German guitarist Yannick Nolting, improvise a song to present the new paths of the Mandengue tradition; a conversation with European sounds and opened to stimulating contributions.
Groovalizacion is in West Africa in search of new music and sounds being made in Mali by emerging musicians and artists. The first artist to have come across our camera is Bezu Dambele, a young musician of Bobo tradition, who gives us an introduction to the popular sounds of Africa such as reggae or soukous. Bobo is one of the various ethnic groups living in the southern part of Mali, Burkina Faso and Ivory Coast.
“I’m surely going to Samba / I’m going to sing my lungs out / Samba is the holy remedy / for those who want to live”. These are the lyrics of Santo Samba, opening track on Pedro Luis e a Parede’s latest album: Ponto Enredo, already in the charts of Groovalizacion last May. Pedro Luis e a Parede is not a Samba band but in this new album the famous Brazilian rhythm can be found in profusion. Produced by Lenine this disc is “in fact an album of broad afro-brazilian music with a lot of Samba and afro-cuban influences” as reflects Pedro Luis. They recently toured Brazil and Europe. On the occasion of their concert in London Pedro talked to Groovalizacion about the band, playing in Europe, recording with Lenine and about the Monobloco project. Then the party began and the next minute they had the crowd raving. To close the night the founders of Monobloco invited a local batucada to join in for a few infectious songs and everybody’s delight. We too are surely going to Samba on Groovalizacion.
TerraKota play a music deeply rooted in the black continent, inspired by immigration from the ancient Portuguese colonies and influenced by Saharan, Caribbean, Hindu and West-Indian sounds. African music is often the simple expression of life in which the musician imitates and uses the sounds of nature in his music. Terrakota endeavour to create fresh sounds and give their music the soul the Western world sometimes lacks when a single human brain can produce almost everything with the sole help of a mega computer. It is as if western music, just like planet Earth already in an advanced stage of degradation, also needed a catharsis; a return to a natural state enabling us to breathe again. Listen to the Mosaico podcast on Terrakota.
