Mali Monday #4: Oumou Sangaré
Image found here.
Official site (which offers a free downloadable track, the lovely down-tempo "NeBife," from her most recent album, Oumou).
Biography
Along with Rokia Traoré, Sangaré is among the best-known female Malian singers in a country whose musical traditions are still dominated by men. Would-be female singers still often meet with stiff resistance from their families and achieve any sort of career at all through sheer force of will (Traoré is an exception to this, though). That sense of having earned her role under duress, I think, is easily visible in Sangaré; no shrinking violet, she. She is a singer of Wassoulou, a contemporary genre of songs, relatively pop-oriented in feel, that deal with themes that confront women in West Africa: the freedom to choose a mate; childbirth; polygamy; etc. She is an advocate for women's rights in a place where the most fundamental of those rights are still very much at issue.
Here are performances of two songs at the Africa Live: Roll Back Malaria concert:
"Tienadjan"
and "Wayenia":
