Bouba Sacko

Among musicians, Bouba Sacko is one of the most respected contemporary guitarists in Mali. When he started playing guitar in the 1960s, the concept of a "griot guitarist" barely existed. The famed musicians of West Africa's Mande people mostly worked with the kora (21-string harp), ngoni (spike lute) and wooden-slatted balafon. Bouba's father, Ibrahim Sacko, was director of the state-sponsored Instrumental Ensemble of Mali, so the traditional repertoire and lore of Mande griot heritage surrounded him from the start. Just the same, Bouba stuck with the guitar, developing a powerful capacity to evoke traditional instruments using his axe.

In 1977, Bouba became the first guitarist to perform along with kora, ngoni, and balafon in the chamber-music-like setting of a great griot chanteuse Fanta Damba. While other Mande guitarists, like Djelimady Tounkara of the Super Rail Band, moved into the realm of electric dance bands, Bouba stuck with the jelimusow (female griot singers).

Over the years, he has accompanied some of the greatest, including Ami Koita, Kandia Kouyate, and his wife, Djessira Kone. Most of these artists' recordings have not found their way to the international market, perhaps because they rely so much on lyric content, and appeal most powerfully to a local audience. Bouba Sacko did participate, along with Djelimady Tounkara, in the sensational 1992 acoustic recording Bajourou. But he has never really recorded under his own name. (Afropop Worldwide Editor Banning Eyre Afropop.org) —Courtesy Calabash Music