World Circuit’s Nick Gold and Jerry Boys travelled with mobile studio to Mali to record a trilogy of albums at the Hotel Mandé, Bamako. The appropriately titled ‘Hotel Mandé Sessions’ series begins with In the Heart of the Moon an acoustic duets album from Ali and the kora virtuoso Toumani Diabaté. Second in the series is Boulevard de l’Indépendance by Toumani Diabaté’s extraordinary pan-African Symmetric Orchestra, a record unlike anything ever heard before from the Malian genius. Completing the trilogy is the final solo album from Ali Farka Touré. Acclaimed as his finest album, Savane is both one of the most traditional and seemingly the most blues-drenched of Ali’s recordings.

Savane has been nominated in the Best Contemporary World Music Album category; also in that category are Richard Bona, Salif Keita, The Klezmatics, and Ladysmith Black Mambazo. Ali has already been successful at the GRAMMY awards, winning his first for the album Talking Timbuktu with Ry Cooder in 1995, and again earlier this year with In the Heart of the Moon, making him the first African musician to win two Grammies.