Prendre mon cadeau - A coupé-decalé special

In Ivorian slang Coupé-Décalé means to cut and run, effectively to cheat someone and get away with it. The attitude and style of this electronic music which evolved in Abidjan and Paris in the early 2000's is of bravado, and If it’s not slightly distorted it’s not being played loud enough as I once found out on a six hour bus journey from Bobo Dioulasso to Ouagadougou. 

You can't say its subtle, but like the music of the griot which we looked at last time on Cambridge 105 it does comment on society, and it certainly makes people move. 

Rendez-vous à Bobo April 2015 by Rendez-Vous À Bobo on Mixcloud

A rendez-vous with Trio Da Kali

For Cambridge 105 this month I made a rendez-vous with Mali's Trio Da Kali on tour for Making Tracks.

Photo Credit: World Circuit Records

Hear Bamako's go-to bala fola Lassana Diabaté in conversation reflecting on a griot's responsibility as mediator and messenger, plus news of Ebola Call And Response a musical statement of solidarity raising funds for Medecins Sans Frontieres and Save The Children

Photo Credit: Penny Lutoslawska

Rendez-vous à Bobo March 2015 by Rendez-Vous À Bobo on Mixcloud

Trio Da Kali at The Junction Cambridge 21.2.15

A griot’s job description is rather diverse. Musician, historian, town crier, the hereditary bards or djeli of West Africa are revered for their skill. Billed as the `new generation of griot soul’ Trio Da Kali from Mali showcased this craft to The Junction Saturday night leaving Cambridge in awe.

The latest offering from world music promoters Making Tracks,Trio Da Kali’s concert began with the clear vibrato voice of Hawa Kasse Mady Diabaté singing an a capella welcome. Joined by Balafon (xylophone) player Lassana Diabaté and Mamadou Kouyaté on three stringed N’goni lute, the musicians wove regal melodies around Hawa’s haunting voice whilst she provided percussion, tossing and catching a Yabara calabash shaker. 

Explaining in French that the trio formed to `revive this music before it disappears’ the first half consisted of songs of advice and responsibility sung in Bamanakan, typical of the repertoire for which Hawa is in high demand at wedding parties in Mali’s capital Bamako. Dressed in the stiff damask or bazin cotton reserved for such occasions, the trio glowed in every sense.

As Lassana played bright runs and arpeggios on his buzzing balafon, Mamadou answered by expressively fretting his n’goni, whilst even Hawa’s humming was magnificent, eliciting shouts of `namu!’ (indeed!) from serenely smiling Lassana.

Speaking before the show, musical director Lassana explained `before radio, internet or telephone, the griot was all of these’ and stressed the djeli’s role as messenger and mediator. Asked if life had returned to normal after the recent crisis in Mali he replied positively but with the griot’s economic eloquence `it’s easy to make war, but not easy to make peace.’

After an interval in which many purchased the group’s eponymous EP released by World Circuit Records, the group returned for a second half consisting of celebratory danceable numbers such as` Yirimadjo’ a homage to the Bamako neighbourhood where Lassana resides. Kicking of her heels, beaming Hawa who in the first half had been as commanding as any teacher, proved the griot know how to party as well as advise.

Closing with `Eh Ya Ye’ a song by her famous father Kasse Mady Diabaté, Hawa, Lassana and Mamadou (whose curled slippers were straight out of One Thousand and One Nights) humbly received the audience’s overwhelmed ovation.

Originally commissioned and published by Local Secrets

Arrested Development at Cambridge Junction 19.2.15

`Refusing to plateau’ 

With big smiles and even bigger hair, hip hop collective Arrested Development performed a back to back set of mash ups from their twenty year career at The Junction on Thursday proving they still have much to say.

The live band plus beat maker dropping samples from a be-stickered flight case tumbled on stage led by front man Speech in a colourful mix of Afrocentric fashion for which they are known.  Opening with the proverbial `Give a man a fish’ the band didn’t pause for breath until 4 songs in with Speech flanked by two backing vocalists styling T Shirts asserting `Racism sucks’ rhyming his way through `fishing for religion’ and other hits as a heavy fatback drummer played steady as a metronome.

Releasing their debut album 3 years, 5 months and 2 days in the life of Arrested Development back in 1992 it was clear from the outset that Arrested Development were different. With positive lyrics and playful sampling of the likes of Prince and Sly And The Family Stone the group arrived with a sense of fun in common with artists like De La Soul, providing an antidote to the bragging and gangsterism of the era’s B Boys. Indeed Arrested development included girls, and seemed more like an extended family in music videos which depicted them down on the farm rather than downtown. Forget the East Coast/West Coast feuding, this was Southern hip hop.

Thanking the audience for `coming to explore and discover what Arrested Development are about’ Speech proved as outspoken as ever in his raps, encouraging community, creativity and respect true to the group’s name which references stunted progress resulting from racism, poverty and community self-sabotage.

Engaging the obliging audience in call and response scat singing, Speech shared the stage equally with the two backing singers, notably Fareedah Aleem who animated the Cambridge audience on this wet evening with her West African inspired dance.

The band were tight and good players but the problem with this gig in J1 was the volume which far exceeded that of the band’s bountiful natural hair.

The mix lacked balance and definition meaning Speech’s quick-fire eloquence was hard to appreciate whilst the guitar of J J Boogie also lost nuance.

Nonetheless the group’s stamina was admirable, as is their longevity and ongoing social engagement which continues through their own Mr Wendal Foundation for America’s homeless.        

Commissioned and first published by Local Secrets magazine

A rendez-vous with Hannah Oghene

For Cambridge 105 this month I made a rendez-vous with the curator of a recent exhibition at Changing Spaces Hannah Oghene.

Plus a meeting of two very different harps from Catrin Finch and Seckou Keita, afrobeat old and new and an introduction to the satirical commentary of Fela Kuti known as yabis. Plus we look forward to Trio Da Kali's forthcoming gig at Cambridge Junction.

Rendez-vous à Bobo February 2015 by Rendez-Vous À Bobo on Mixcloud

In praise of Mr Chiwetel Ejiofor

The National Theatre have announced their new season including Chiwetel Ejiofor in Everyman. I last saw Ejiofor in The Young Vic's astonishing A Season In The Congo here revisited. 

A Season in The Congo At The Young Vic Thursday 11th July 2013

The lights go down suddenly suggesting a tropical power cut and we find ourselves in The Congo as independence dawns. Seated cabaret style in a drained swimming pool with oil drums for tables, The Young Vic is merrily festooned with strings of coloured bulbs, evoking the bright exhalation of independence that too soon will dim to the sinister terror of Mobutu's Zaire.

But that's all in the future and A Season In The Congo begins as independence springs.

Written in 1966 by Aimé Césaire the play recounts the tragic trajectory of Congo's first president Patrice Lumumba deposed in a coup after just twelve weeks in office.

Sporting a crisp parting and perfectly pressed trousers we first meet Chiwetel Ejiofor as Lumumba as a charismatic travelling salesman hawking beer rather than Pan Africanism. With a restless energy and gift for oratory it's clear he is destined for bigger things than beer.

Cheered on by a cast costumed in juxtaposed wax prints with army fatigues, Lumumba's legend grows as does Ejiofor's, inhabiting the role here with conviction as he rebukes the departing Belgians for making "laundry boys" of men and promising to "straighten every crooked thing." Singing a lullaby to his wife he picks sweet guitar lines to soothe her nightmares, but far away rumbles of the changing season and Lumumba's peripeteia can be heard.

Weaving puppetry and music brilliantly into the narrative the direction is as dapper as Lumumba himself, whilst Daniel Kuluuya becomes genuinely menacing as Mobutu and Ejiofor seems to surpass himself with every role.

In a closing scene of gravitas, Lumumba's former friends sit at a table suggesting the last supper and silently pass a plastic basin washing his assassination from their hands and so concluding our tumultuous season in The Congo.

A digital scrapbook part one

A selection of published and broadcast contributions

 

Reader profile in Songlines magazine

 

 

 

 

Clear Spot Extra at 8.50pm – We Must Dare to Invent the Future – by Lucas Keen

June 26th, 2013 · 

The Clear Spot is a little short of the usual hour tonight, so it is followed at 8.50pm by a new short documentary feature. We Must Dare to Invent the Futureby Lucas Keen tells the story of the making of an album in West Africa earlier this year for which Keen was supported by the Arts Council and British Council to travel to Burkina Faso. It’s an affirming story of friendship and perseverance told against the backdrop of the crisis in neighbouring Mali.

Radio feature broadcast on Resonance FM

Radio transcript published on British Council Voices