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 Oumou
Sangare is Mali's great diva, champion of women's rights, and
one of the world's most astounding female voices. Oumou is her
first new release in 7 years. Compiled by Charlie Gillett and
Nick Gold, this 2 CD collection contains 8 songs never released
on CD, alongside a career retrospective of 12 of the best tracks
from her previous 3 critically acclaimed albums (World
Circuit). All tracks have been digitally re-mastered and
the CD booklet contains song notes by Oumou Sangare herself.
Drawing deep from a wealth of musical traditions from southern
Mali, Oumou Sangare's idiom is the hypnotically rhythmic home-grown
music that has become her trademark: wassoulou.
Like all the genuine 'greats' of any
musical genre you may care to mention, Oumou Sangare owes her
position in the West African Hall of Fame to something over
and above the ability to sing well. Songwriter, social commentator,
champion of women's rights, spokesperson for her generation
and her sex, Oumou is more than just a mere 'singer'. She is
something closer to a phenomenon because she embodies values
and struggles many people care deeply about, because she is
an African, and above all, an African woman, who speaks her
mind without a trace of fear.
Oumou Sangare was born in Bamako in 1968, to parents who had
immigrated to Mali's burgeoning capital city from the region
south of the Niger river known as Wassoulou. Her mother, Aminata
Diakhite, was also a singer who, like most women of her generation,
had to share her husband with two other wives. This formative
experience of polygamy and its potential for causing pain and
suffering made a deep impression on the young girl. Oumou's
mother encouraged her to develop her precocious talents as a
singer, whispering to her terrified daughter just before she
took the stage of Bamako's Stade des Omnisports for her first
public appearance at the tender age of six, 'Sing like you're
at home in the kitchen.' After a period as a member of The National
Ensemble of Mali, the training ground for many of the country's
top musicians. Oumou was asked by Super Diata Band veteran Bamba
Dambele to accompany his traditional percussion troupe Djoliba
in 1986 on a tour of Europe. Following this brief introduction
to the musician's life, Oumou returned home with the exceptionally
precocious determination to form her own group and form her
own sound based on the styles and traditions of her ancestral
homeland, Wassoulou.
For reasons which even Oumou herself is hard pressed to explain
adequately, the Wassoulou region has produced a remarkable number
of great women singers since Mali gained its independence in
the early '60s. She regularly names pioneering figures like
Coumba Sidibe, Sali Sidibe and Flan Saran as important influences.
All who together with many others, forged a distinct style of
music based on local dances and rhythms like the didai, the
bari, the sigui and above all the sogonikun - a traditional
masked dance performed mainly by young girls at harvest time.
This unique style which came to be known as 'wassoulou', combines
the djembe drum and karyaing (scraper), propelled rhythms of
the regions traditional dances with the jittery yet funky sound
of the kamalengoni (literally 'young man's harp') - an instrument
which has played a key role in the development of wassoulou.
Adapted by the youth of Yanfolila in the heart of Wassoulou
from the donsongom (an ancient harp used in rituals by the wassoulou
forest hunters), the kamalengoni in may ways symbolizes youth
and, if not rebellion in a rock 'n' roll sense of the word,
then at least a sense of fun, freedom and a certain amount of
rule-breaking.
Shortly after her return from Europe, Oumou started working
with the highly revered arranger Amadou Ba Guindo. Together
with a fine group of musicians including Boubacar Diallo on
guitar and Aliou Traore on violin, Oumou and Amadou Ba set about
constructing a tight and highly individual sound, aiming for
something rooted in tradition and yet unique and modern at the
same time. Oumou replaced the traditional horse-hair fiddle
or soku with a modern violin which had not been used by in a
wassoulou line-up before, and brought in the calabash or fle
as a percussion instrument. After two years of hard work and
experimentation, the group was offered a recording session.
Oumou and company traveled to Abidjan in The Ivory Coast and
in seven days at the legendary JBZ studios they recorded Moussolou,
a collection of six original Oumou compositions. On its release
in 1989 the record sold over 200,000 copies. The public and
the pirates went crazy and at 21, Oumou was a star.
Moussolou (Women) is a classic of modern African pop.
In its own way it represented something of a revolution in the
way African music is recorded and produced. With their crystal
clear and beautifully sparse sound based on traditional and
mainly acoustic instruments Oumou and Amadou Ba had concocted
a viable alternative to what had previously been perceived as
the only options: tacky synth 'n' drum machine driven 'modernity'
or unlistenable low-fi DIY trad 'obscurity'. Oumou's approach
to her music also echoed the deeper struggle of her peer group
for a cultural identity in which tradition is not thrown in
the bin, but modernized with its essential character and strength
intact. Oumou herself stresses the fact that although she speaks
out against the abuses of traditional social customs such as
polygamy, she herself is not anti-tradition. "Just look
at the clothes I wear," she says "aren't they traditional!"
While the incredible success of Moussolou put Oumou
firmly on the West African map, it was only after a fortuitous
introduction by the legendary Malian guitarist Ali Farka Toure
in 1991 that UK label World Circuit picked up the rights for
the album and began to develop Oumou's international career.
Moussolou was given a universally positive reception
on its worldwide release and Oumou, pen and inspiration never
at rest, set about working on songs for her second album Ko
Sira (Marriage Today) recorded in Berlin and released on
World Circuit in 1993. Ko Sira includes 'Saa Magni',
a moving tribute to the memory of Amadou Ba who died in a car
crash. "Death struck down Amadou Ba Guindo," she sings,
"death spares no creature, nothing can stop it, not even
fame."
With Ko Sira, Oumou notched up her second best-selling
album and consolidated her fame. Back home politicians rushed
to associate themselves with her perceptive views on contemporary
morality but Oumou remains defiantly non-aligned. She received
numerous awards in Mali and Ko Sira was voted European
World Music album of the Year (1993). Despite the arrival of
her first child she set out on grueling tour schedules in Africa
and Europe and in 1994 she paid her second visit to the USA
as part of the Africa Fête package tour, performing to
delighted audiences at Summer Stage in New York's Central Park.
For her third album Worotan (Ten Kola Nuts ... i.e.
... the traditional bride-price in Mali) released in 1996. Oumou
worked with Pee Wee Ellis, James Brown's erstwhile horn-man
and stalwart of the 'Horny Horns', who made an enthusiastic
yet respectfully controlled contribution to the Sangare sound.
Nitin Sawhney, the British Asian guitar wizard also made an
important contribution to the album, especially on the final
song 'Djorolen', one of Oumou's most moving compositions to
date.
Perhaps the core reason for Wassoulou's national and later international
popularity was that it offered people, especially young people,
a welcome alternative to the ancient and predominant Malian
tradition of the jalis, or praise singers. Whereas the jalis
sing the praises of important men and the glory of their ancestors,
Wassoulou singers tackle everyday concerns in their songs. Whereas
the jalis direct their praise at a particular individual (usually
a pillar of society and community) hoping for a handsome reward.
Wassoulou singers sing for everyone with no particular financial
kick-back in mind. Whereas audiences will sit through the performance
of a jali musician and listen with quiet reverence, Wassoulou
singers expect their audiences to get up and dance.
Imbued with this 'Wassoulou' approach Oumou Sangare is definitely
the thinking person's female star. When it's time to speak plain
truths, she never shirks from her task. Throughout her recorded
work the same themes recur; the struggles of women in a male-dominated
Muslim society, the conflict between tradition and modernity,
the puzzling sorrows and joys of life and death. With her imposing
stature, defiant beauty, courageous intelligence and extraordinary
voice she manages to impress and amaze almost everywhere she
goes, in the streets of Bamako, the boutiques of Paris, the
stages of the international concert circuit. When she sings
with the soulful power of an Aretha Franklin or Patsy Cline,
looks you right in the eye and says, "I will fight until
my dying day for the rights of African women and of women throughout
the world," you just know you're dealing with someone very
special.
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