African music misplaced certainly one of its titans final week with the demise of Amadou Bagayoko, a guitarist who recorded with American rock stars, carried out on the Nobel live performance for Barack Obama, and have become a nationwide icon in his dwelling, Mali.
Along with his spouse, the singer Mariam Doumbia, Mr. Bagayoko composed the duo Amadou & Mariam, which rose to worldwide fame within the 2000s and 2010s with hits like “Beautiful Sundays.”
Mr. Bagayoko was 70 when he died last week, of issues from a malaria an infection. He and his spouse, who’s 66, have been scheduled to carry out throughout Europe subsequent month. And whereas their fame has pale in the US because the peak of their international success, they remained large celebrities in Europe and in West Africa, the place their music impressed generations of artists.
We requested kinfolk and associates of Mr. Bagayoko for his or her favourite songs by Amadou & Mariam, and the importance of the guitarist and his music — a mix of blues riffs, guitar solos, and djembe — to them.
‘Toubala Kono’
Cheick Tidiane Seck, a keyboard participant who knew Mr. Bagayoko because the guitarist was 14, was in neighboring Ivory Coast for a live performance final week when Mr. Bagayoko died.
Mr. Seck opened the live performance with “Toubala Kono,” a music he wrote with Mr. Bagayoko, whom he referred to as a “brother.”
However he couldn’t end performing it, he mentioned in an interview, including, “I might have collapsed.”
With solely a spare, reverberating guitar doing round riffs, the music revolves round loneliness, a sense that Mr. Seck mentioned had haunted him since his pal’s demise.
‘Mogoya’
Sam Bagayoko is the one certainly one of Mr. Bagayoko’s and Ms. Doumbia’s three youngsters who embraced a musical profession. He had toured along with his dad and mom and was in Paris to prepare their deliberate live shows in France this summer season when Mr. Bagayoko died.
His dad and mom have been particularly pleased with how their songs saved interesting to youthful generations, he mentioned in a phone interview from Bamako, Mali’s capital and the household’s dwelling, the place guests have been coming this week to pay tribute.
His favourite music is “Mogoya,” which he composed for his dad and mom to carry out with him. Within the music, he performs the guitar along with his father whereas his mom sings about every day life in Mali and guarantees that individuals typically fail to maintain.
“It was all the time an honor to play with my dad and mom, however this was our final collaboration collectively,” mentioned Sam, who’s 45. “I’ll by no means see nor hear my father’s guitar anymore.”
‘I Assume About You’
Idrissa Soumaoro, a well known musician and singer in Mali, met Mr. Bagayoko in 1973, when at 19 years previous he joined the band Les Ambassadeurs du Motel de Bamako.
He shortly noticed that “Amadou was vibrant and bold,” he mentioned.
Later in that decade, Mr. Soumaoro skilled Mr. Bagayoko and Ms. Doumbia at a Malian nationwide college for blind individuals, the place they deepened their friendship. (Mr. Bagayoko was blind, as is his spouse.)
On the college, Mr. Soumaoro mentioned, they’d hearken to blues for hours in a rehearsal room, engaged on tonalities in what Mr. Soumaoro referred to as “analysis work like I’ve by no means achieved with another musician.”
Mr. Soumaoro picked “I Assume About You,” a love music that the duo launched in 2005, saying, that the couple’s love “was additionally a part of their success.”
“In it, Amadou sings, ‘I take into consideration you, don’t abandon me,’” mentioned Mr. Soumaoro, who’s 75. “He didn’t abandon her, however the unhappy actuality is that he has left her.”
He added, “I hope Mariam could have the energy to bear life.”
