Sibling Success: Touré Kunda and "Casalé"

Touré Kunda brings us today's random tune, a reggae inspired piece called Casalé. A Senegalese band formed by brothers Ismaïla and Sixu Tidiane Touré in the 1970s, the band worked their way up the music scene in Paris before releasing their first album in 1979. After a long tour of Africa in the mid 1980s, they returned to France to find that they were critical darlings in the French press, leading to an invitation to play for Nelson Mandela in 1992. They are well known for their musical versatility, and sing in Soninké, Wolof, Fula, Mandingo, Diola, and Portuguese creole. They have collaborated with musicians such as Carlos Santana and the Talking Heads, and are also very well known for their political activism. You can find Casalé on their 1992 album Sili Béto, on their their 1999 retrospective album Légende and on the 1994 various artists compilation Putumayo Presents: The Best of World Music-World Dance Party.

Listen to songs like this and more on the KUNM Global Music Show every Monday night from 10 pm - 1 am Mountain Standard Time. Live streaming, program information and the two-week digital archive can be found at http://www.kunm.org.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tour%C3%A9_Kunda

Portuguese Dancing: Santana and "Africa Bamba"

Carlos Santana brings us our random tune for today. Wait, how is a rock and roll legend on this world music blog, you may ask? Carlos Santana is a Mexican-American musician whose band Santana pioneered the fusion of American rock and roll with Latin American music by highlighting Latin and African rhythms and instrumentation like timbales and congas. He started music in Mexico at five, learning violin and then guitar from his father, a mariachi musician, and he became very influenced by the music of Richie Valens, and blues artists like B.B. King, T-Bone Walker and John Lee Hooker. His guitar playing came to notice in 1966 when Paul Butterfield was unable to perform at the Fillmore West and Bill Graham was persuaded to ask Carlos Santana to fill in as guitarist with an impromptu band of musicians from Butterfield's band, the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane. After forming the Santana Blues Band (later shortened to simply Santana), he quickly gained a following on the San Francisco music scene, and in 1969 gave a memorable performance at Woodstock which led to the band signing with Columbia Records. The band churned out such hits as Oye Como Va and Black Magic Woman as well as others over the next few years, but their popularity fell into decline over tensions within the group and a lot of changeover in musicians. The 1990s and beyond has brought Santana back into the limelight due to radio-friendly and more pop-oriented music, often in collaboration with many of the hit artists of newer generations. This song, Africa Bamba, is from his 1999 album Supernatural, which won nine Grammy Awards. The song was co-written by members of the Senegalese musical Touré clan, including members of Touré Kunda.

Listen to songs like this and more on the KUNM Global Music Show every Monday night from 10 pm - 1 am Mountain Standard Time. Live streaming, program information and the two-week digital archive can be found at http://www.kunm.org.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Santana; http://www.santana.com/

Anything but Plebian: The Pleb with "One for Senegal"

Our random tune comes from Italy by way of Africa. The Pleb is one of the performing names of Moreno Visini (He is also known as DJ Zeb). From Northern Italy, he left home at age 14 and ended up in London, where he learned electronic programming and sequencing, and where he was heavily influenced by Asian and Arabic music. In the mid 1980s, he was invited to join the American alt-rock band The Indians, but after they disbanded in 1994, he went back to experimentation with electronica and world music. This song, One for Senegal was inspired by the song Amadou Tilo by Senegalese band Touré Kunda in honor of a fallen brother who had died of a heart attack on stage in 1983. Visini heard it late one night in his apartment and was transfixed. He sampled the song, a mostly a capella, rootsy style of track, and put a funky Afrobeat drum rhythm and guitar riffs under it. The surviving members of the band have greatly admired Visini's interpretation of their song. You can find One for Senegal on the compilation CD Putumayo Presents: African Groove (2003).