Malian maestro Bassekou Kouyate is a virtuoso picker and musical visionary whose work blurs the lines between West African and American roots music. Bassekou’s instrument, the ngoni, is a “spike lute” and an ancestor of the banjo, sharing its taut-skinned drum body, percussive attack, and varied picking techniques. Since 2005, Bassekou has led Ngoni Ba, the first-ever group built around not one but four ngonis-all played by members of his family.

Out of the same West African ground that spawned the ancient Mali empire, comes Basseko Kouyate and his band armed with their four ngonis. Kouyate’s latest album with his band Ngoni Ba-I Speak Fula, brings eleven warm earth passages prospered by the small stringed ancestor to the banjo. Kouyate was long ago inspired to move the music beyond where his ngoni forefathers had gone, and as result has become a savior for the instrument and a symbol of innovative Malian music. Kouyate’s wife, Sacko is a vocalist on the album, adding yet more complexion to this moving mirror of aural history. –from parasitesandsycophants.com

BASSEKOU KOUYATE & NGONI BA – Speak Fula