TalkingGigs marry stripped down musical performance with conversation, stories, lyrics, anecdotes, images and video – a kind of musical theatre that engaging, insightful and entertaining.
TalkingGig: Songhoy Blues
Category: Subjects A-Z
An A-Z of subjects other than musician’s names
TARAGALTE FESTIVAL – Dreaming of a better Sahara
Three generations of poets guitarists sing of their hopes for the Sahara at the Taragalte Festival 2016 in Morocco
After Gao: how important are mixed patrols to Mali’s future?
With the world’s media riveted to events in Washington, the West African nation of Mali might be forgiven for feeling a little abandoned in one of its darkest hours since independence. Last Tuesday January 17th at 9am a young jihadist by the name of Abdel Hadi al Foulani drove a pickup truck into a military…
BLICK BASSY: Simonobisick’s Letter
Simonobisick is a character from Blick Bassy’s novel ‘Le Moabi Cinema.’ This letter from the novel, which Simonobisick writes to his mum, reads like a statement of Africa’s frustrated youth.
The Bataclan and the battle for music
Anyone who walks out onto any stage – in Paris, or London, or Madrid, Melbourne, Mumbai and Osaka – is now in the front line of a battle. Music itself is on the front line. Take courage. We’ve got to win. The alternative is too bleak to contemplate: a life without joy, relief, togetherness. A life without music.
MBONGWANA STAR – Kinshasa’s Afro-junk revolutionaries
If the master plan succeeds, Mbongwana Star could become the Trojan Horse that penetrates the bastion of the world’s indifference (and revulsion and paranoia) and lifts the curse to bring that creative power out of rue Kato, the Beaux Arts, and other parts of Kinshasa. “The Beaux Arts is like a town within a town,” says Renaud. “Mbongwana Star has started rehearsing there and there’s a correlation with visual artists, stylists, people working on logos etc. It’s this kind of electric movement, this new vibe in Kinshasa that we’re trying to mix in with the music and the image.”
SOUAD MASSI – What can Ibn Arabi do against Daesh?
“I think we’re lacking a lot of tolerance,” says Souad Massi, “and I think that we must give the power to the learned people in Islam… They’re the ones who will show us the way.”
PHOTO ESSAY: Songhoy Blues in Bamako
My 2014 photoshoot of Songhoy Blues in the Laffiabougou district of the Malian capital, Bamako, which yielding the cover shot of their hit debut ‘Music in Exile’.
CD SLEEVE NOTES – ‘Clychau Dibon’ by Catrin Finch & Seckou Keita
You don’t pair the greatest young harpist in Wales with one of the most innovative kora players from West Africa for the purposes of relaxation. Their music is too deep, full-blooded and fragile for that.
MUSIC AND JIHAD IN MALI – “Mali without music is an impossibility”
All the musicians I spoke to agreed; Mali without music would be like Egypt without cotton, a bird without wings, a man without a soul.
