Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni Ba - "Ngoni Fola" (Mali)

Posted by urbanafrica
April 17, 2008

Video Summary:
"Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni Ba - Ngoni Fola"

Here's some information about Bassekou Kouyate from his Wikipedia page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bassekou_Kouyate

"Bassekou Kouyate (born in 1966 in Garana) is a musician from Mali. His band is known as Ngoni Ba...At the age of 12, he started playing the Ngoni. In the late 80's he moved to the capital Bamako...

Kouyate's wife, Ami Sacko, is also a musician and performs in his band [2]. His father Mustapha Kouyaté was a ngoni player and his mother Yagaré Damba was a praise singer...In 2008 -Bassekou Kouyate won the BBC3 Awards for World Music - Album of the Year & African Artist of the Year "

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Here's some information about the "ngoni" from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ngoni_(instrument)
"The ngoni or "n'goni" is a string instrument originating in West Africa. Its body is made of wood or calabash with dried animal (often goat) skin stretched over it like a drum. In the hands of a skilled ngoni instrumentalist, the ngoni can produce fast rapid melodies. It appears to be closely related to the akonting and the xalam and this instrument family is believed to be the ancestor of the American banjo. This ngoni is called a jeli ngoni, played by jeli's (griots, West Africa's storytellers and musicians) to perform at celebrations and other special occasions to play the traditional songs (fasa's in manding-language).

Another type of ngoni is believed to have originated among the donso, a hunter and storyteller caste of the Wasulu people. The larger donso ngoni is still largely reserved for ceremonial purposes while the smaller kamale ngoni has entered popular musical styles such as Wassoulou music."