Malian singer-songwriter Fatoumata Diawara brings vibrant music to the Chan Centre, April 14
The Grammy-nominated artist sings mostly in Bambara, the language of Mali
Fatoumata Diawara.
Chan Centre presents Fatoumata Diawara on April 14 at 8 pm at Chan Shun Concert Hall
FATOUMATA DIAWARA IS one of the most compelling and important voices on the planet. Born to Malian parents in Ivory Coast in 1982, Diawara spent her youth in the Malian capital of Bamako. Having left home at age 19 to join the French street theatre company Royale de Luxe, Diawara toured the globe, going on to sing solo in clubs and cafés in Paris. From there, she sang backup vocals for American jazz singer Dee Dee Bridgewater and Malian superstar Oumou Sangaré on tour and on recordings.
In 2011, the World Circuit label released her acclaimed debut album, Fatou. Her latest album, Maliba, speaks to the importance of protecting the Timbuktu Manuscripts, a collection of historic cultural artifacts that were threatened with destruction in Mali.
Drawing on everything from syncopated Afropop to funk, Diawara is coming to Vancouver for a one-night-only appearance as part of the Chan Centre Presents series.
The Grammy-nominated artist sings mostly in Bambara, the language of Mali, about everything from family and humility to migration and women’s rights to how to build a better world for future generations.
“I’m so proud and so happy…with my ancestral past,” Diawara has said. “Many of the ideas I use come to me in dreams about my ancestors. And to be given a chance to help protect our ancestral and cultural legacy is so special to me.”
Over the years, Diawara—who plays electric and acoustic guitar— has performed with Herbie Hancock and Cuban pianist Roberto Fonesca, among many others. She assembled a West African super-group featuring Amadou and Mariam, Oumou Sangaré and Toumani Diabaté to record a song calling for peace in her troubled homeland.
In 2022, she performed at New York City’s Carnegie Hall for the Journey into Afrofuturism Festival. “Fatoumata Diawara, the singer and guitarist originally from Mali, provided two of the night’s most striking moments,” Rolling Stone reported. “Her ode to the power of women, ‘Mousso,’ sung in her native language, was hypnotic, and her captivating stage spins enhanced her anthemic ‘Unite.’”
Based in France, Diawara is also a social activist, campaigning against the trafficking and sale of Black migrants in Libyan slave markets. As an actor, she appeared in Abderrahmane Sissako’s Timbuktu, which The New York Times ranked as the 12th best film of the 21st century to date, among other films.
Tickets and more details are here.
