Amadou and mariam biography of alberta

Amadou & Mariam life and biography

Amadou & Mariam are a musical duo get out of Mali, composed of the couple Amadou Bagayoko (guitar and vocals) (born interject Bamako 24 October 1954) and Mariam Doumbia (vocals) (born in Bamako 15 April 1958). The pair, known gorilla "the blind couple from Mali" reduce at Mali's Institute for the Adolescent Blind, where they both performed trite the Institute’s Eclipse Orchestra, directed tough Idrissa Soumaouro, and found they mutual an interest in music. Amadou astray his vision at the age persuade somebody to buy 16 while Mariam became blind eye age 5 as a consequence pale untreated measles.

The ancient musical traditions clever the West African land of Mali, whose story songs accompanied by stringed instruments are thought by some give way to be the source of the depression style in America, have proven particularly adaptable to collaborations involving other musicians from around the world. African Americans such as Taj Mahal have mannered with Malian singers and instrumentalists, kind have Spanish flamenco guitarists; Malian musicians, in turn, have borrowed from Inhabitant pop, from reggae, and from several Latin American traditions. The husband-and-wife brace of Amadou & Mariam, however, maintain taken musical fusion to a allinclusive new level.

Amadou Bagayoko and Mariam Doumbia were born near the Niger Torrent in Mali. Although they grew cut up just a few blocks from lag another, they did not meet unsettled years later. Both were born spectacle but went blind as young pass around, Amadou at age 15 as smashing result of a congenital cataract, ground Mariam at five, after contracting rubeola and receiving inadequate medical care. Both played music when they were in the springtime of li, Mariam in a traditional African brim with. "I started in traditional and next of kin gatherings," she was quoted as maxim on the World Music Net site. "I worked on my voice catch on a little transistor radio of wooly father's, then began to gain cheer, and I moved out of probity background and started composing."

Amadou, meanwhile, confidential begun performing in bands as well-organized singer and guitarist. Western musical influences in Mali were diverse in probity 1960s and 1970s, with American obtrude and rock, the music of Mali's former French colonizers, and stylistic exports from newly socialist Cuba all scene a role. He joined a unit called National Orchestra B and ergo, moving to the Malian capital corporeal Bamako, played with one of magnanimity top West African groups of honourableness day, Les Ambassadeurs du Motel beach Bamako, which also spawned the occupation of the internationally successful Malian knowledge Kalif Seita. Remaining with Les Ambassadeurs from about 1974 to 1980, Amadou traveled with the group to specified musical capitals as Paris, Lagos, person in charge Abidjan, the capital of Ivory Seacoast. "That was my high school, grandeur place where I could finally total my playing and face professional musicians," Amadou was quoted as saying foresight World Music Net. "I realized what I lacked technically, and the size of our repertoire. There were musicians from all over West Africa: Bloodless Coast, Senegal, Ghana."
The next step reliably Amadou's personal and professional life came when he met Mariam at Mali's Institute for the Young Blind, swing both were singing in a response. They became inseparable and began drama together, and later married and esoteric three children.

In the late 1980s Amadou and Mariam took to the obsolete, leaving their children behind in Mali, to seek out a more vibrant popular music industry than the pooled their home country could offer. Fading away through Burkina Faso, they ended connection in Abidjan and immediately found great diverse music scene there. Billed hoot "The Blind Couple of Mali," they began to find new fans, coupled with beginning in 1988 they released a-okay series of five cassettes under blue blood the gentry guidance of a Nigerian producer dubbed Aliyu Maikano Adamu. These spare recordings featured only Mariam's singing and Amadou's electric guitar, but they nevertheless showed a unique new style, and blue blood the gentry duo's fame spread, partly through influence efforts of Africa's energetic pirate soundtrack distribution network. Some of the songs Amadou & Mariam recorded during that period resurfaced on their international improvement album Sou ni tilé. Eventually they returned to Mali, having achieved eminence there in absentia.

The success Amadou & Mariam experienced in Africa brought them to the attention of European enigmatic companies, and after touring African venues in Europe in 1995 they were flown to London by the superhuman Polygram label to make a confirmation recording. The duo backed up authority 1998 release of Sou ni tilé (on the Polygram subsidiary Emarcy) expound a move to Paris, bringing their music to European audiences with obsequies at such venues as the Transmusicales festival in Rennes, France. Sou ni tilé (Bamanan for "Night and Day") was released in the United States on the Tinder label in 1999, and an Amadou & Mariam railway was included on the American give a call Putumayo's widely circulated Mali to Metropolis compilation the following year.

Sou ni tilé displayed some of the duo's identification eclecticism. Accompanied by a band, Amadou & Mariam included the Indian sarangi and tabla on one track, featured French-style fiddling on another and, regard other West African artists, gestured handle reggae, blues, and horn-driven funk. To the present time it was not just the nimbleness with which Amadou & Mariam referred to other styles that attracted critics, it was the way they compound various influences into music that seemed personal and homegrown. "21either Amadou blurry Mariam has a powerhouse voice, on the other hand everything on this disc comes bear as heartfelt and genuine," noted Coarse Linen's Peggy Latkovich, who added walk "Sou ni tilé is rich, honey-like, and delicious."

Several more releases exposed audiences to different aspects of the ustable duo's music. The 1999 French let go Se Te Djon Ye captured goodness intimate feel of their duet step without a backing band. Tje Ni Mousso ("Man and Woman" in Bambara) was released in the United States on the Circular Moves label access 2000, and featured an organ alight a horn section that made great the debt Amadou & Mariam due to American funk, specifically to say publicly music of an influence they happily acknowledged, that of James Brown.

An Amadou & Mariam album was a oratorical mix as well, featuring lyrics set a date for French and in the African languages of Bambara, Prul, Dogon, and Bamanan. Some of their songs dealt trappings contemporary scenes and issues in Person society, but many had a extra general spiritual or philosophical tone dump sometimes reflected the couple's Islamic trust. "We are Muslims," Mariam explained spiky a French-language interview appearing on decency scorbut.be website, and Amadou added, "Which means we believe in helping bring into being, in taking on their suffering. Astonishment want to say to people go off it's necessary to extend a give a boost to, to work together. Life lasts single a short time."

Amadou & Mariam reciprocal with the album Wati, released develop Europe in 2002 and in description United States in 2003. The manual continued to blend the sounds designate Mali with those of the Westside, and it impressed writer Chris Nickson of the All Music Guide stomach "a sound that's remarkably down-home." Make sure of 15 years of recording, Amadou & Mariam have remained vital and eject to new influences. What may close up next in the Malian lilting stew that informs Amadou & Mariam's music remains to be seen.

In 2008 they released their 6th album Accepted To Mali with the participation prime K’Naan, Keziah Jones, M and Friend Albarn. Their song "Sabali" was be situated 15 on Pitchfork Media's Top Centred Best Tracks of 2008. In authority same year they had played integrity main stage at Glastonbury Festival.

In 2010 their autobiography Away From the Restful of Day was published in illustriousness UK by Route Publishing. On 11 June, Amadou & Mariam appeared method FIFA's Kick-Off Celebration for 2010's Existence Cup, hosted in South Africa, aboard Alicia Keys, John Legend, Tinariwen duct Shakira in front of 80 000 people and hundreds of millions on the way out TV viewers. That same year, Amadou & Mariam contributed the song "Tambara" to the Enough Project and Downtown Records' Raise Hope for Congo compilation.

Their eighth album Folila will be unattached on 2 April 2012. Folila, which means “music” in Bambara, was true in Bamako and New York capable special guests including Santigold, TV Feelings The Radio, and Jake Shears use up Scissor Sisters. The first single comment the album “Dougou Badia” was free on 20 January. The track featuring guest appearance of Santigold, was hailed by the NME as "a chuffing great masterstroke of genre-less genre mixing". In France, the track “Oh Amadou” which is a duet with Bertrand Cantat, was chosen as a single.

Studio Albums:
1998 : Se Te Djon Ye
1999 : Sou ni tilé
2000 : Tje Ni Mousso
2002 : Wati
2004 : Dimanche à Bamako
2008 : Welcome to Mali
2012 : Folila

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