Transcultural collaboration within the context of West African griot music: Exploring the role of the drummer and the case of the band Faso Kan

Ossi Raippalinna

The purpose of this text is to reflect on my experiences as an active member of a culturally diverse ensemble called Faso Kan. The primary source is the artistic work of Faso Kan during the years 2006-2020. The ensemble worked intensively during 2020-21, resulting in an album completed in September 2021. My main contribution to the album was adapting and arranging traditional West African rhythms for the drum kit and performing them in the studio. This study attends to cover different aspects of that process, particularly the drummer’s point of view. I will also cover the collaboration-based music-making approaches that I encountered while working with Faso Kan. Although Faso Kan´s repertoire consists mainly of traditional pieces from Burkina Faso, the working methods resulted in music representing several musical cultures. The study is primarily based on artistic work, but I will also reflect on the related experiences of other researchers and musicians.

Griot blood -centuries of musical storytelling

If West African music is under discussion, there is an absolute need to mention the griots. Andy Morgan interviewed the world-famous kora player Toumani Diabate successfully describes the griots in an article for The Guardian.

Take the bone-dry shell of a large gourd, a straight length of rosewood, and a piece of cow or antelope hide, combine them with 200 years of craftsmanship and 21 strings, and you have the kora: sub‑Saharan Africa's most sophisticated native instrument. Then take a man or woman born to the task of reciting epic poetry from memory and picking the ripest words out of the air to praise or placate – now you have a griot: the hereditary bard of West Africa. Put kora and griot together, and you have the foundations of West African music and culture.

According to Toumani Diabate, he comes: ”from a musical dynasty that stretches back 77 generations” (Morgan, A. 2014, May 22 ). Such long lineages of uninterrupted musical tradition are rare globally but found in several cases in West Africa. The griots have many roles in society. Issa Dembele describes the griots as: ”...the memory card of the community. Our part is to remember important things and pass them to the following generations orally.”.(O.Raippalinna 2021, Feb 19). The oral transmission happens in the form of stories that are accompanied by an instrument. Often the instrument is not only accompanying but imitating the language the story is told in. As the talking drum player, griot Yamar Thiam explains: ” Everything You talk, you can play also... This drum is talking.” This is the case in several balafon traditions too.

Photo: The talking drum players are praising master drummer Ousmane "Zoumana Dembele" during his son's wedding festivities. Bobo Dioulasso 2009. NEXT PAGE

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