Ali Farka Touré Ry Cooder | en

Al Tourettes, known to his Mum & Dad as Alec Storey, has been playing drums since he was 9. His father is also a musician, & he started DJ’ing when he was 15, writing music on an Atari 2 years later. He studied Creative Music Technology at Bath Spa University from 2002 - 2005 - incidentally the same course as Appleblim, Gatekeeper and Wedge. Alec had his first release in 2006 on Growth Recordings, with subsequent releases on Birmingham’s KracktroniK Records and Sweden’s Input Output Recordings as well as remixes for Lukes Anger's Bonus Round Records. In Spring 2008 Al...

Vieux Farka Touré is a Malian singer and guitarist, and son of one of the African continent's most internationally renowned musicians Ali Farka Touré. Since his childhood, Vieux Farka Touré has been deeply inspired by the music of his father, Ali Farka Touré. Growing up in Mali's capital, Bamako, as well as in his father's hometown of Niafunké in the Sahara desert - both teeming with rich musical life - Vieux proved himself a precocious talent as a drummer and calabash player. Ali, however, grew concerned about his son's future as he observed his son's budding musical gifts. Having long...

The Early Years Touré Kunda was originally formed in 1979 by the brothers Amadou Touré (born 1943), Ismaila Touré (born 1950), and Sixu Tidiane Touré (born 1950). Ousmane Touré (born 1955) joined the group a few years later. They were born to Soninké parents in the Casamance region of Senegal. The name Touré Kunda translates literally from the Soninké language as "elephant family". Their parents were Daby Touré (1875-1956), and his wives Mafili (Sixu Tidiane), Masse (Amadou Seckou and Ismaila), and Dionfolo (Ousmane). The Touré brothers developed local renown as a singing and percussion group, playing music based on traditional...

Israeli superstar Idan Raichel and Malian guitar virtuoso Vieux Farka Touré́ first met at an airport in Germany in 2008 while both were on tour. From this chance encounter an artistic kinship was born, culminating in an unscripted recording session that took place one afternoon in November 2010 in a small Tel Aviv studio. Joined by Israeli bassist Yossi Fine and Malian calabash player Souleymane Kane, Idan and Vieux improvised a masterful selection of songs that capture the unbridled creativity and inspired collaboration of these four brilliant musicians. The Touré-Raichel Collective was formed and the songs they recorded are the...

Ali Farka Touré (October 31, 1939 – March 7, 2006) was a Malian singer and multi-instrumentalist, and one of the African continent's most internationally renowned musicians. His music is widely regarded as representing a point of intersection of traditional Malian music and its North American cousin, the blues. The belief that the latter is historically derived from the former is reflected in Martin Scorsese's often quoted characterization of Touré's tradition as constituting "the DNA of the blues". Ali Ibrahim "Farka" Touré was born in 1939 in the village of Kanau, on the banks of the Niger River in Gourma-Rharous Cercle...