Ronnie Scott’s 10th -11th July 2012 / £24 – £45 / Doors 6pm / www.ronniescotts.co.uk / 020 7439 0747
Only his voice can blend Niger and Mississippi river alluvia with such moving authenticity. His unique, inimitable, self-taught guitar technique owes a great deal to his kora influences, but its shades and phrasing also suggest the great black bluesmen of the deep American South: Blind Willie McTell, Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters and others.
Oumou Sangare by Damian Rafferty
One of Africa’s finest female vocalists returns to the Barbican with songs from her Grammy-nominated album Seya. With support from Anibal Velasquez y Los Locos del Swing.
Continue reading Oumou Sangare – Barbican, London, 30 June ’11
Sheffield Doc/Fest Trailer 2011 from Sheffield Doc/Fest on Vimeo.
This year’s programme is packed with docs about musicians and subjects ranging from Hole drummer Patty Schemel, to A Tribe Called Quest, to Genesis P-Orridge, to a record shop in Newcastle Upon Tyne, to Roma gypsies and Slovakians, to 2 men who shout a lot at each other (not so much music as a cult phenomenon), to Queen, to Justin Bieber, to Miriam Makeba, to Michael Nyman, to Siddheswari Devi to more
Continue reading Music Documentaries at Sheffield Doc/Fest 2011 – 8-12 June, 2011
Kerieva's playing at Celebrating Sanctuary
Continue reading Celebrating Sanctuary London 2011 – Sunday, 19 June 2011, 2 – 7pm
The huge domed chamber of London’s Roundhouse rocked to the Soukadelic sounds of Staff Benda Bilili and melted at the charms of Fatoumata Diawara
Continue reading Staff Benda Bilili and Fatoumata Diawara – Roundhouse (Live Review)
The guvnor
Editor and Publisher of Fly | Global Music Culture
The Rhythms of Black Peru
New Afro-Peruvian compilation of undiscovered gems comes out on vinyl and download.
After more twists and turns in his recent record label adventures than the sale of Liverpool FC, it’s great to get a new album from Femi Kuti
A night of contrasts, propelled by the power of soukous
Continue reading Nsimba Foggis & Taxi Pata Pata – The Tabernacle (Live Review)
Kiwi dubsters pack ‘em in at Limehouse’s The Troxy
Continue reading Fat Freddy’s Drop – The Troxy, London (Live Review)
Begin at the end, so they say, and the end for Lobi came suddenly and out of the blue. He died in June at 49. Like Habib Koite is, Lobi was a people’s musician. Friendly and down to earth, Lobi was well known to hustlers and music fans alike in clubs like the Djembe in Bamako. A short time before his death, he grabbed half an opportunity to record an album and here it is
Late at night in Salif Keita’s studio in Bamako a cellist and a kora player recorded their jams. Vincent Segal (cellist) tells us what lay behind his collaboration with Ballaké Sissoko
