African Musician Ali Farka Toure Dies

[Jahness]

African Musician Ali Farka Toure Dies



Ali Farka Toure, a traditional African musician who won two Grammy Awards, died Tuesday in his native Mali after a long illness. He was in his late 60s.

Mali's Culture Ministry said Toure died at his home in the capital, Bamako, after a long struggle with an unidentified illness, the ministry said.

Toure, one of Africa's most famous performers, played a traditional Malian stringed instrument called the gurke.

He was best-known overseas for his 1995 collaboration with American guitarist Ry Cooder on "Talking Timbuktu," which netted him his first of two Grammys.

He won another Grammy this year in the traditional world music album category for his "In the Heart of the Moon" album, performed with fellow Malian Toumani Diabate.

Across his deeply impoverished west African nation, people mourned Toure's passing and radio stations suspended regular play, sending Toure's signature lilting sounds out over airwaves instead.

Toure was born in 1939 in the northern Sahara Desert trading post of Timbuktu. Like many Africans of his generation, the exact date of his birth was not recorded.

Toure learned the gurkel at an early age, later also taking up the guitar. He cited many Western musicians for inspiration, including Ray Charles, Otis Redding and John Lee Hooker.

Toure spent much of his older age in his childhood town of Niafunke, which has become a pilgrimage spot for many music-loving Africans and tourists seeking one of the original progenitors of a genre known as Mali Blues.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060307/...RrBHNlYwM3NjI-

Copyright © 2006 The Associated Press.

[WombanAuset]

wow,may the ancestors kiss his eyelids.

[Sun Ship]

Brother Ali Farka Toure music is extraordinary…you can hear the strong and undeniable connections between diasporic Blues and traditional African music in his sound, for it’s all traditional African music.

May he add to the great ancestral orchestra of the unseen realm and inspire every note of those who are left to keep the spirit of our music alive.

Mojuba Ali Farka Toure

[Jahness]

Greetings WombanAusset & Sun Ship!

Welcome to the discussion!

Brother Ali Farka Toure was nourishment for the mind, body and spirit.
He will truly be missed.

It is up to us now as Afrikans to make sure his work lives on especially
by us taking the time to share it and teach it to the youths.

One thing as a people we have been blessed with so many greats, that it would be our own fault if we let them be forgotten. His name and musical contributions should be up in all our libraries and places of learning and education.

The Ancestors are embracing this elder now, and may we continue to
do the same.

May his spirit be forever blessed and be at peace.

Much appreciation to you both for sharing your valued input.

Peace & Blessings of Afrikan Love!

[Ta'Ziyah]

Hotep...

It's sad to hear about him passing away like this, especially from an illness & may he now be at atonement and continue to be known for his talents now & in the future.

Peace.

[Asafo37]

i'm very sad to hear this. i just posted a proverb in the Afrikan languages Kikôngo section that goes Mûntu mu mèso kaka kafwanga. That is to say: In (Our) eyes only does a person ever die. It was not long ago that i stumbled on Nana Farka's music and when i did it was like finding a buried treasure. i've been to Mali and am presently studying Bamana - the language in which Farka records most of his music. i love his music. It speaks to me in an Ancestral kind of way. My family has always had a strong Chicago-Mississippi blues connection which made Nana Farka's music connect with me all the more deeply. He will be deeply missed...and his music as does he lives on...
Asafo37

[Ta'Ziyah]

Hotep!

After reading this article I started listening to this album...it's a very beautiful album from last year as well as the rest of his works.

Peace.