SHEFFIELD: University Firth Hall

TUE 9TH NOV, 2010 19:30

Mamane Barka (biram)
Oumarou Adamou (percussion)

A night in the company of Mamane Barka is a chance not just to experience a beautiful, forgotten music but also to hear the fascinating story of Mamane Barka’s quest to rescue the biram, a sacred harp, from extinction.

Mamane Barka of Niger was born into a family of Toubou nomads and grew up to become a teacher and then a celebrated musician with desert blues at his heart.

A decade ago Mamane heard about the beautiful sound of the biram, an enormous boat shaped 5-stringed harp sacred to the Boudouma people of Lake Chad. When he learnt there was only one elderly player of the instrument left Mamane went to live with the Boudouma to study with the old master, learning the instrument and to be initiated into it’s rituals and ancient, mythical songs. On the death of the master, Mamane was bequeathed the instrument and charged with bringing the biram to the attention of the wider world.

Now Mamane maintains the tradition single-handedly touring the world with Oumarou Adamou, the son of a Hausa griot, whose trance-enducing percussion is the bedrock of this extraordinarily powerful desert blues.

"It's a funky and urgent sound ....that has an absorbing, hypnotic effect on the listener"
fROOTS Jan 2009