Mali: An Interview With Idan Raichel

6 September 2012
ThinkAfricaPress

The Israeli pianist discusses his latest collaboration with Vieux Farka Touré.

When Ali Farka Touré travelled to Los Angeles to record with Ry Cooder, it was very much an exploration of the remarkable similarities between these two guitarists. Ali, a Malian, had frequently seen his music categorised as 'blues', so this album was in essence a reverse roots trip.

Pick a random track off 1994's Talking Timbuktu and Ali and Ry's guitar parts sound indistinguishable. Something so instinctively human as to pluck a string under tension, they demonstrated, predates the ancestral displacement of America's musical history. It was perhaps the Grammy award-wining quality of Talking Timbuktu that inspired Ali's son Vieux to embark on his own cross-cultural project.

An impromptu meeting

Vieux met his eventual collaborator, Israeli pianist Idan Raichel, by chance whilst waiting in an airport. Where else does modern life present a better opportunity to bump into someone suitably unfamiliar? "Crazy hippy" was Vieux's first impression. From Idan's perspective, Vieux Farka Touré, presumably sitting by his tell-tale guitar case, was more than just a fellow musician. "I grew up listening to the great Ali Farka Touré", Idan tells Think Africa Press proudly. "My piano playing is hugely influenced by Talking Timbuktu. Later I'd invent piano parts to Ali's earlier works, and try to imitate the kora as closely as possible."

In November 2010, Vieux travelled to Israel to record The Tel Aviv Session with Idan. Whereas Talking Timbuktu saw Malian and American blues melt into one, The Tel Aviv Session could have been recorded in Mali by an all-Malian band. This is in every way a compliment to Idan's excellent imitation of the kora, a traditional West African harp, made by plucking the piano strings with the appropriate speed and grace. Idan explained why absorbing influences comes naturally to an Israeli.

"With the dominance of Vieux's guitar and the fantastic calabash playing of Souleymane Kane, the session had a deep Malian feel. I see my role as an artist taking music from all over the world and giving it a twist. I don't see the project as Israeli music but more a collaboration with an Israeli musician. This is the essence of who we are and what we do in Israel. We have a recent history of immigration from all over the world so it's difficult to define Israeli food, Israeli cinema or Israeli music. Every few years there is a new immigration that changes the face of our society. The Tel Aviv Session is Malian music as interpreted by an Israeli who instinctively knows how to blend sounds and emphasise melodies."

The result is the most like Ali that Vieux has sounded to date, thanks largely to a decision to go completely acoustic. Without Vieux's trademark electric riffs, Kane's calabash is indeed fantastic; from the hypnotic opener 'Azawade', the session is a flawless display of Malian percussion. Also present is Israeli bassist Yossi Fine, who produced Vieux's second album Fondo.

"With acoustic music there is nothing to hide," says Idan. "The album sounds like what it is - four musicians sitting in a living room having a jam session at 2am. It was a bold concept for Vieux, as he always records with an electric band. He's been toying with the idea of going acoustic for many years and I'm glad to have led him in this direction. Going acoustic gave us a higher dynamic range to explore."

A cross-cultural association

A late highlight to the album is 'Ane Nahatka', featuring Tigrit vocals from the Ethiopian-Jewish singer Cabra Casey. Her offering represents a passion that goes back a long way for Idan.

"I worked as a counsellor in a boarding school for Israeli immigrants. There were many Ethiopian-Jewish youths who had come from Addis Ababa or from refugee camps in Ethiopia's Begemder region. I saw how they retained the music of Ethiopia to keep alive their identity as new immigrants in Israel. I would walk along the little streets around our boarding school and this strange, incredibly loud music would come from open windows above."

"In class I asked the Ethiopians where I could hear this music live. They took me to some concerts in a downtown area of Tel Aviv. It was just a magical world for me and its soundtrack captured my heart. I was hugely impressed by Ethiopia's great vocalists like Mahmoud Ahmed and Gigi and their acoustic instruments like the krar and the masenqo. Cabra Casey is the lead singer for my main group The Idan Raichel Project, and both Vieux and I were extremely grateful when she agreed to take part in The Tel Aviv Session."

he Tel Aviv Session was released by Cumbancha Records on the September 3.

Read Think Africa Press' interviews with Vieux Farka Touré here and here.

Clyde Macfarlane is a travel writer and music critic. He won a Guardian Student Media Award in 2009, while studying social antropology from Manchester University, and he has since had several articles published for the paper. He also writes for Songlines Magazine, specialising in African and Caribbean music genres. Follow Clyde on twitter @ClydeMacfarlane.

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