Customer Reviews

In the Heart of the Moon

5 star:		(27)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a rare feast! Two of Mali's finest musicians getting together for a couple of jamming sessions! There were no rehearsals, just immediate harmony, understanding of the music and each musician exhibiting appreciation of the other. Both artists brought their rich repertoire with them, one leading the other into a melody they both knew and off they went... creative improvisation combined with virtuosity of their two instruments, guitar and kora. The backup team included no other than famous American guitarist Ry Cooder and his son Joachim.

IN THE HEART OF THE MOON may have taken a few hours to record, but the build up to this first musical encounter of Mali's musical giants took many years. Listening to them play, you wouldn't believe either time span. Having met and heard them both play in informal settings, I can imagine the sessions, the wordless intuitive exchange through eye contact and gestures. The result is, as they say, magic! According to the accompanying notes, they themselves were surprised how well each understood the musical culture of the other. Both could adapt their playing style to the other's requirements. It demanded completely new harmonies on Toumani's kora - it softened the voice of Ali's guitar. Toumani's comment: "This is a record of music that did not exist before!" It melds the different musical traditions of two distinct Malian cultures.

Ali Farka Touré and Toumani Diabaté have both been household names of Mali music for a long time. One is famous as Mr. Blues and the other admired as Mr. Kora. Their styles are rooted in their respective ethnic cultures: Ali comes from the northern Songraļ and Toumani from a long line of (southern) Mandé griot tradition. They are also from two generations. Toumani admired Ali's music as a child. "Toumani is a child born in my hands" says Ali in the notes. He played with Toumani's father, Sidiki Diabaté, also a famous kora virtuoso.

This album features by and large traditional compositions, most of them instrumental, some adapted by Ali for guitar, and one composed by Toumani dedicated to Ali on his election to Mayor of his hometown Niafunké. Those familiar with Malian music will recognize many of the tunes and enjoy the beauty of their interpretations. Those unfamiliar with its rich repertoire will find this album and excellent introduction. Just one warning - you will want to buy more recordings of both artists. [Friederike Knabe]

Having experienced Toumani Diabaté's music before, I instantly recognized it on a local "Bonjour Africa" radio show this afternoon. Racing to my local music seller to buy this disc, I found the last copy. You'll have no such trouble here, lucky you. This music is amazing ... the entrancing, rhythmic interplay between Touré's gentle guitar and Diabaté's lilting kora are like two string instrument spirits filling the room with their joy. Despite being recorded with a mobile setup in a hotel room on the banks of a river, the sound is lush and full-bodied; the bass response needs no subwoofer to penetrate to your bones. A few very deft overdubs by Ry Cooder and his son Joachim, and others, don't intrude.

This album is world music the way that non-world music fans probably prefer it: accessible, gentle, amazing, and worth repeated playings, either out loud or quietly in the background. Dare I say it's even good "date music." Play the samples here and judge for yourself.

My favorite African music album is Diabate's previous album with his relative, Ballake Sissoko, "New Ancient Strings".

However, this album is probably more accessible to the listener who has little experience with non-Western music. This is because the familiar tonality of the guitar gives the new listener something to fasten onto.

The music is quite excellent in its own right, and will be refreshing to the listen who is dismayed at the recent tendency of pop Western music to dispense with melody altogether.

This album is really a jam session between two superb musicians from two connected but different African cultures. I've been a fan of Toure for years, and love his collaborations with Ry Cooder. This time Cooder stays in the background, and the music is different, but haunting and brilliantly performed. I have the feeling that a conversation is going on between these two men on many levels through their music--almost a mediation of cultural differences and antagonisms.

A gently entrancing dance of two beautifully focused and masterful artists, from its first chords In The Heart of the Moon is irresistible. Modest, never showy, these two deservedly celebrated musicians engage in a hypnotically rhythmic interplay of two distinct but highly compatible instrumental voices. Fans of the hit album Talking Timbuktu, with the late Ali Farke Touré and Ry Cooder, may be hoping for stronger blues riffs, and could be prone at first to mild disappointment with this subtler pairing. One needs to give the deceptively simple repetitive patterns time to build, weave their spell, and enthrall you with a trance effect that is at the heart of traditional African music.

I imagine these two fine string players sitting out under a tree in a village square on a hot afternoon, playing... just playing, and listening intently to one another with a kind of reverent joy. Occasionally I hear an exclamation from one in Malian dialect or a few phrases sung, spontaneous moments that are the more precious for their rarity. A smattering of applause at the end of one number reflects the intimacy and immediacy of audience.

The album was actually recorded in a hotel room in the heart of Mali's capital city, Bamako, overlooking a river dotted with fishing boats. In three two-hour sessions the album was complete, every song recorded in a single take. Remarkably, this is the first time Farke Touré and Diabaté have played together. Yet Farke Touré's guitar and Diabaté's twelve-string traditional kora come together in a union meant to be, as if they'd always known one another. One will hold down a bass line, and with a nod let the other take off on an improvised solo. Then at a mutually intuited moment, the other will take over the sinuous lead line. Nick Gold, the American record producer who initiated the project, said that at the end of each song he realized he'd been holding his breath through the recording - the music was so hypnotizing.

Clearly Farke Touré and Diabaté have profound respect for one another. In the touchingly poetic album notes, Farke Touré reveals that they are from different tribes and different musical traditions in Mali. And while customarily it's rare for two players to perform together in this way, they did so with no borders, no competition, bringing to life a repertoire of songs from the 1950s and '60s with no rehearsal. Diabaté calls Farke Touré the "lion of the desert," the "prophet of the blues," and marvels that he could so effortlessly flow into music not of his own tradition. He says he first heard Farke Touré on Radio Mali when he was a child, and felt his music was strange, but great. For his part, Farke Touré calls Diabaté "a child who was born in my hands." Such is the magic of their music. Perhaps that birthplace was in the heart of the moon.

I have been listening to a lot of 'world music' lately and while I have heard a lot of great stuff nothing matches the beauty of this. It bears many repeated listenings and its mystery and charm cannot be worn out. I suggest that if you have had a tough day this music will sooth the frazzled edges without ever sinking to the banalities of designed 'mood music'.

I read from one review that not even 5 million stars could rate this album. I agree. If you are a musician, and you know what it gets to play what these 2 wise monsters of music play, you know that what you have in front of you requires technique, inspiration, and lots of wisdom...

I have heard this CD a million times, and every time I listen to it I just stop whatever I am doing and see myself traveling in some magic world of feelings, conversations. Have you heard "Mamadou Boutiquier"? What a perfect masterpiece! How could in the earth someone just get together, play, and create such a beauty? How can two people, without rehearsing, who have only played once together, who play different music traditions, create something like that? How the song evolves, build its momentum through a progressive intensity, cries out so loud the power of music?

And Hawa Dolo? Ali Farka's song, not one of my favorites, reaches a different dimension in this version. The nostalgic power of this song is difficult to equal.

Kala, Debe, and Kadi Kadi's solos... my gosh! I don't know, I listen to this music and I feel overwhelmed with humility, with admiration to how much these two musicians must know about life, about human beings, about the strings inside us, to do what they just did.

Remember that this is not an improvisation, as Ali says in the cover. They both knew what they were playing, even though they had never played together. They understood a language that for most of us is a mystery.

Thank you Ali Farka and Toumani, the beauty of your work is so inspiring!

Another "tour(e)" de Force from the Lord's favorite guitarist and if that wasn't enough we are treated to the exquisite sounds of Diabate's kora.
This is music I want to spend eternity in.
It is Heaven to the ears.
Five stars aren't enough-5 million stars might not be enough to give this music the "rating" it deserves.
I feel like I have found the music I've been searching for all my life.
I understand how George Harrison felt when he discovered Ravi Shankar and Hindustani classical music in general-the rapture of his soul.
This music is the soundtrack of my DNA.
TO label it "essential" is like calling the air we breathe "essential".
Let God bless you and get this CD ASAP!

As the late, great Ali Farka Touré says in the sleeve notes to In the Heart of the Moon, `If you know something and don't want to share it, then you are selfish.' Ali would then appreciate the fact that I am unreservedly recommending one of the last records he recorded before his untimely demise. Here you will find Ali on guitar along with king of the kora, Toumani Diabeté, playing West African melodies that will make the hairs on the back of your neck tingle. Two masters at the top of their form.

This album is full of some of the most gorgeous music you'll hear. It has an incredibly natural sound- beautifully recorded. I played it at a dinner party recently and 3 people asked me about what was playing and then bought the CD.