ley-lines:

“Djama” — Idrissa Soumaoro

Super heavy and hypnotic organ-driven music—I was going to call this funk, but I don’t think that’s particularly accurate—from 1970s Mali, off of one of Syllart’s African Pearls comps. Originally one of Salif Keita’s Ambassadeurs, Idrissa Soumaoro’s career is still going; here is a quite spellbinding collaboration with Ali Farka Touré.

This blog post claims that “he became one of the rare African specialists (more over not blind) of teaching music in Braille. He quickly started teaching his students and formed a pair of renowned groups. Two of his former students were the now famous Amadou and Mariam Bagayoko.” I don’t know if that’s true, but I’d really like to learn more about Malian music—any suggestions?