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I Speak Fula: Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni ba

For ethnomusicologists, the recording studio is more and more an extension of ‘the field’. Because the CD is how most people are exposed to ‘world music’ traditions, it plays a role in representing a musical style to local and global audiences. There are few examples of album producers whose work with musicians is underpinned by their own research and knowledge of the tradition. I am one such producer. For this album I drew on existing knowledge from my original fieldwork, while also engaging in new collaborative research with the artists, to create a showcase for the little-known musical heritage of the empire of Bamana Segou (1712-1861). The intention was not an ethnographic recording but a creative interpretation of this almost forgotten tradition. Although its oral epics have been published, my audio and printed publications (including two of my REF submissions) are the first to document the music.

On this album, as music producer, I advised on repertoire, timbre, instrumentation, arrangements, and overall sound and texture, in order to stay faithful to the spirit of Bamana music but using a contemporary voice. This album rescues important oral material from the early 19th century, such as the title track (I speak fula), which illustrates the relationship between the Bamana and the Fulbe from this period. The research for this Grammy-nominated album used various methodologies: interviewing and recording practitioners and audiences, gathering new information from oral histories; performing and working with musicians from Segou, and detailed scrutiny of a number of texts and other oral sources that document the epic oral traditions getting a sense of what the music might have sounded like.

I speak fula would have sounded very different without my research input, and Bamana Segu music might have had much less impact both at home and abroad.