Toumani Diabate & The Symmetric Orchestra. KB, Malmö 31/10/06
Toumani Diabate from Mali is probably the most famous Kora player in the world and together with his West African All Star band called The Symmetric Orchestra he visited Malmö this cold and windy October night.
The concert was somewhat uneven. The band consists of about 17 people, of whom four are vocalists. As the songs were extremely long due to drawn-out solos by, for example, drums and kora, each singer just got one or two songs each. I think the concert consisted of just 7-8 songs although it lasted for more than two hours (which maybe was a little too long)!
In some songs, this was West African music at its best, that is an explosion in rhythm. In others, I found myself starting to think about other things due to too many and too long-winded solos. And even though it was interesting to hear about the story of the Kora as an instrument told by Toumani between two songs, the long speeches between the songs harmed the intensity of the concert. But in all, this was a sympathetic evening with a sympatetehic and symmetric band:-). And the record Boulevard de l'independence is definitely worth buying. Rating: +++ (but in some parts it was close to 5).
Toumani Diabate from Mali is probably the most famous Kora player in the world and together with his West African All Star band called The Symmetric Orchestra he visited Malmö this cold and windy October night.
The concert was somewhat uneven. The band consists of about 17 people, of whom four are vocalists. As the songs were extremely long due to drawn-out solos by, for example, drums and kora, each singer just got one or two songs each. I think the concert consisted of just 7-8 songs although it lasted for more than two hours (which maybe was a little too long)!
In some songs, this was West African music at its best, that is an explosion in rhythm. In others, I found myself starting to think about other things due to too many and too long-winded solos. And even though it was interesting to hear about the story of the Kora as an instrument told by Toumani between two songs, the long speeches between the songs harmed the intensity of the concert. But in all, this was a sympathetic evening with a sympatetehic and symmetric band:-). And the record Boulevard de l'independence is definitely worth buying. Rating: +++ (but in some parts it was close to 5).
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