Amadou & Mariam
Amadou et Mariam, once billed as The Blind Couple of Mali, are just that, a blind husband and wife musical act. Guitarist Amadou met singer Mariam at the Institute for Young Blind People in Bamako, Mali. They are Bambara, significant because Bambara music bears obvious resemblances to American blues. Their largely acoustic debut, 'Sou Ni Tile', connects America's Mississippi delta, Mali and the Middle East. The root is Malian traditional music, but the Syrian, French and African musicians in the band all bring different colors to this stunning collection.
Their release, 'Tje Ni Mousso', is a more rollicking electric version of African blues. Afropop editor Banning Eyre says in an Afropop review: "The most rocking African pop record I've heard in a long time".
Amadou and Miriam seem to hear their own music through the filter that made them marvel when they were adolescents: the pop of the Seventies, electric blues, reggae, Cuba... Without ever conceiving of it as a project, without even really thinking about it, man and woman caused their distant offspring, those who cradle was the Dark Continent, to come home. And this opening onto the world, this sense of hospitality, recharged the music of West Africa with a vital energy, and secured it in the maternal role that founded its identity.
Their record gives "world music" a sense, a function, and a center of gravity that previous misuse of the term had hidden, damaging its reputation. The phrase invites us to a double understanding which can be found again in the use of words distilling counsel and recommendations, as happens in village meetings where the old exchange words with the young: and this manner of keeping a watchful eye, of preaching respect, patience and tolerance, finally causes little local virtues to unfold in a universal wisdom. With simple words, Amadou and Mariam relate the superiority of harmony over discord.