Rendez-vous with Lucas Keen for an appointment to meet the little boat shaped lute played across the West African Sahel since the time of Mansa Musa. Hear the story of the djeli n’goni, get the job description for a griot, and learn where this iconic instrument which is the...
Tag Archives: African Music
CALLING ALL FIERCE WOMXN and lovers of! Led and curated by one of our own DJ Sophie Darling, Rhythm Passport will be hosting a full day streaming festival on Saturday 13th June inspired by Sophie’s podcast series: Femina Del Fuego – Fundraiser Festival. Femina is Latin for Feminine and we’ve...
![Album Review: Simo Lagnawi & Gnawa London – Africa Soyo [February 2020]](http://www.rhythmpassport.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/simolagnawi-soyo-cover-1-335x335.jpg)
In recent decades, the music of the Gnawa has transitioned from a repertoire of ritualistic trance-inducing songs – performed exclusively for the adherents of its night-long healing ceremonies – to a more profane yet equally transfixing professional type of music, played on festival stages and in venues the world over. Due not...
![Album Review: Spoek Mathambo – Tales From The Lost Cities [TEKA Records; February 2020]](http://www.rhythmpassport.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/spoek-mathambo-tales-335x335.jpg)
‘Remember back when good rap was just a cool dance hit / Even though it wasn’t saying shit’, Paris spat on his militant debut The Devil Made Me Do It. Released only three months before Rodney King’s assault, it made an accurate prediction about the future of hip-hop. Try looking...
3MA are somewhat a pan-African power group formed of Ballaké Sissoko, Driss El Maloumi and Rajery in which they interweave three different musical traditions, each ancient, from various parts of Africa. Ballaké Sissoko represents Mali by playing the traditional West African harp – the kora – of which the playing...
In our new podcast series, we’ve chosen to focus on who provide us with the precious “raw material” for our listenings and features: quality new music! We are talking about those heroes who decided to launch, nurture and cultivate a record label (better if with an ‘independent’ in front of it). As the...
We start the Rhythm Passport On Air year with a bang! For the first episode of 2020, we hosted and interviewed a gifted musician, tireless activist and extraordinary woman, Fatoumata Diawara. In light of her upcoming London show at the Roundhouse (on the 30th of January, part of In the Round...
The last mix of the year (compiled for us by La Dame aka DJ Carie) was also a unique opportunity to introduce you to a thrilling new label, born between Lyon and Bamako little more than six months ago. We’re talking about Blanc Manioc, the new project by Dom Peter,...
View La Dame bio here We have the pleasure to close the year with a mix from a brand-new and exciting music reality, a French-Malian new label, delving into the depths of the West African underground electronic music scene. To discover Blanc Manioc’s sound, we were lucky to have a guide...
You can call it Afro-jazz, but we prefer to define it “Afro-joy”, because that’s what Kongo Dia Ntotila eventually bring and share with their music. The London-based six-piece band, led by talented Congolese bass player Mulele Matondo, presents an upbeat fusion of Central and West African styles, blending together the aforementioned...
