Artist Bio:
Kasse Mady Diabate was born in Kéla, Mali, in 1949. The Diabatés are one of the two biggest griots families. Their ancestor, Morykaba Diabaté, fought with Soundjata in the 13th century.
Kela is the capital of the griots, the Mecca of musical tradition. All of his cousins, brothers, sisters, know how to sing without micro before thousands of people, but Kassé Mady is different because of his sweet voice. He owes his fame in Mali to this gentle, though powerful voice.
At 20, he was already famous in Kangaba, the old Mandingo capital. Demba Diallo, the governor of the Kangaba district formed an orchestra and asked him to join it as a singer. For the first time, Kassé Mady experienced electric music. Within a few years he has become the premiere Malinke singer (dominant ethnic group in Mandingo country).
His fame reached Bamako, and in 1972 theYouth Ministry named him as singer in the Badema National Orchestra. Until 1988, Kasse Mady led a double carrier of griot for men in high places and in popular parties and polyvalent singer with an electric orchestra in the capital.
Apart from the large amount of the Badéma's tapes dispatched in the Mandingo country, Kasse Mady had had no other opportunity to make an album in solo. In 1988 Ibrahima Sylla, the producer of many African hits asks the famous arranger Boncana Maïga to record a solo album with Kasse Mady. Boncana, a Songhay from Gao, has a vast musical culture. He studied for eight years in Cuba, where he founded the Maravillas de Mali.
He is a virtuoso who can perform Bach flute sonatas, played with Fania All Stars in New York, and composes hits of pop music and 12-tone string quartets! For both Kasse Mady and Boncana, cutting a record together was an adventure, from which each can marvel at the talent of the other.
Universal and timeless, this CD by one of West Africa's most beautiful voices, draws on all the musical wealth of Mali to present an album unlike anything that has been recorded before.
Guests include Orlando "Cachaito" López, Toumani Diabate and Basekou Kouyate.
One of the most sensational voices in Mali's Manding griot tradition, Kasse Mady is best known internationally for his work with Taj Mahal on the Kulanjan recording and the subsequent tour. This spontaneous, unadorned set was recorded by the Mexican Corazón label in the singer's home town, Kela, and it attests to why tradition and pop are hard to separate in Mali.
The session amounts to a high-tech field recording, but it includes two Afro-Cuban numbers, "Maimouna" and Orquesta Aragón's "Balomina Mwanga." Kasse Mady famously interpreted these songs back in the '70s, when he was playing in Malian fusion bands. Here he revisits them using traditional instruments, the wooden balafon in place of piano, and djembe drum in place of congas.
Many songs are drawn from Manding music's rich repertoire, like the opener, "Eh Ya Ye," with its rolling balafon lines and plinky acoustic guitar, crisp female voices in a swinging chorus with the slap of a djembe keeping time, and that wonderful, relaxed voice at the center. "Kaba Mansa" has a mystic air, with its cycling, minor-key vamp. There are songs from hunters' tradition and harvest celebrations, but in the end, this is a pop record, tersely arranged, and loaded with hooks and melodies.
-- Banning Eyre, Afropop Worldwide
