Mandinka, Wolof, Fula, Bambara, Dyula, Soninke — Mali, Guinea, Senegal, Gambia, Burkina Faso · Sahel and savannah zones of West Africa — the former territories of the Mali Empire (13th–17th century) and its successor states
In performance — music and words inseparable. The Jali plays kora or balafon, sings the genealogy and history, addresses the patron, calls on the ancestors, and builds to the performance's peak. The performance is circular — the griot returns to…
The Mandé world is organized by nyama — the invisible energy or force that flows through all living things. Certain practitioners (the Jali/Griot, the blacksmith, the hunter) accumulate nyama through their specialized knowledge and practice. The world is also organized…
Allah (Islam arrived in the Mali Empire in the 11th century and has been integrated with traditional practice). But in the griot tradition, the supreme force is less theological than cosmological — it is the nyama that flows through everything.
The kora — 21-string harp-lute, made from calabash and cowhide. The balafon — wooden-keyed xylophone, the oldest instrument of the tradition. The sosso-bala (the original balafon of Sumanguru Kante) held at Niagassola, Guinea, is UNESCO-recognized sacred heritage. The djembe drum.
spiral