Jan
8
Submitted by webmaster on Fri, 01/08/2010 - 10:22
Mali - African Music Legends - Salif Keita 3
Posted by idamawatu
June 16, 2007
Video Description:
Throughout most of this video, Salif Keita, a world renown afro-pop singer-songwriter from Mali, plays an acoustic guitar & sings "Falon" outdoors surrounded by young boys and girls. Keita is wearing western style pants and shirt. At the end of the video, Keita is shown on an stage performing his song. During that performance, he is wearing a form of traditional African clothing. The lyrics to this song are superimposed on the video. See comment #1 for those lyrics.
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3 comments
These two comments from http://planetwaves.net/pagetwo/2010/01/13/astrology-of-haiti-earthquake/ that I just read seem to encapsulate what the song "Falon" means:
Fe, I appreciate the article [about the history of Haiti and why that nation is so poor now]* . It goes with something I’ve had a gut feeling about [that] for awhile now. The chickens are coming home to roost on the heinous crime of slavery. Goes with Eric’s assessment about our Grandmother’s not always being right too. People always turned their heads and minded their own business in the old days, but we can’t do that anymore. Turning away from people who are having the sh*t kicked out of them is not even close to being the right thing to do.
-Patty on Jan 13 2010
*That article is quoted on that page by Fe Bongolan on 13 Jan 2010 at 1:06 pm
**
patty
Exactly right.
Turning our heads away in this day and age is the sin of this last century in the name of progress for the developed industrialized world over the poor. It is the legacy of human exploitation, in operation even as our own country was being “born”.
-Fe Bongolan; Jan 13, 2010
****
Give to Haitian earthquake relief efforts such as
http://doctorswithoutborders.org/
and
http://www.shelterbox.org/
Here's an excerpt from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salif_Keita/
"Salif Keita (born August 25, 1949) is an internationally recognized afro-pop singer-songwriter from Mali. He is unique not only because of his reputation as the Golden Voice of Africa, but because he has albinism and is a direct descendant of the founder of the Mali Empire, Sundiata Keita. This royal heritage meant that under the Malian caste system, he should never have become a singer, which was deemed to be a griot’s role.
Keita was born in the city of Djoliba. He was cast out by his family and ostracized by the community because of his albinism, a sign of bad luck in Mandinka culture.[1] He left Djoliba for Bamako in 1967, where he joined the government sponsored Super Rail Band de Bamako. In 1973 Keita joined the group, Les Ambassadeurs. Keita and Les Ambassadeurs fled political unrest in Mali during the mid-1970s for Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire and subsequently changed the group's name to Les Ambassadeurs Internationales. The reputation of Les Ambassadeurs Internationales rose to the international level in the 1970s and in 1977 Keita received a National Order award from the president of Guinea, Sékou Touré.
Keita moved to Paris in 1984 to reach a larger audience. His music combines traditional West African music styles with influences from both Europe and the Americas, while maintaining an overall Islamic style. Musical instruments that are commonly featured in Keita's work include balafons, djembes, guitars, koras, organs, saxophones, and synthesizers"...
Falon
by Salif Keita
In the past
no one questioned me.
In the past
that’s how it used to be.
In the past whatever happened…
In the past no one wanted to know.
In the past
no one questioned you.
In the past
no one questioned me.
In the past that’s how it used to be.
In the past whatever happened…
In the past no one wanted to know.
People who had suggestions to make,
people who could think for themselves,
people who were hungry…
In the past whatever happened…
In the past you couldn’t speak about it.
In the past.
In the past no one wanted to know.
Today
you’re supposed to take part.
Today
I’m supposed to take part.
Today we’re all supposed to take part.
Today whatever’s happening
we’re all asked to take part.
Today
people want to know.
In the past people didn’t want to know.
In the past.
In the past people didn’t want to know.