Salif Keita's Influence On Mandinka Culture

Afro-Pop

In the country of Mali in Western Africa, the music is very similar to the other African nations. It is ethnically diverse, however there is one influence that stems from the ancient Mali Empire of the Mandinka. The Mande people make up about half of the country's population, and they have brought Mande-based Afro-pop into the world, and adopted traditional garb and styles as well. One singer I would like to focus primarily on is Salif Keita, he was born in Mali during 1949, and has a reputation as the “Golden Voice of Africa”.
When he was young, he was abandoned by his family and excluded from the community because of his albinism. In Mandinka culture, albinism is considered to be bad luck. He wanted to become a teacher, but decided to turn to music when he saw that being a teacher would be an unfit job for him, due to his lack of sight caused by his albinism. His family disagreed with his choice to become a musician because it was considered to
When he was 18 he left his hometown behind to live on the streets of the capital. A man named Tidiane Koné, a saxophonist spotted Keita’s powerful voice in a market he had been singing in and invited Keita to join a government sponsored Super Rail Band de Bamako in Bamako. This rail band was built upon the mid 20th century craze for latin jazz music that came out of the Congo in the 1940s.The Band was one of the first West African acts to combine mature Afro-Latin sound with traditional instruments and styles. The band sold out venues and stadia all across Western Africa, and helped launch Keita’s career as a singer. After he got his start with the Rail Band, Keita moved and joined the group known as Les Ambassadeurs in the year 1973. He fled political unrest in mali, with the new band in the mid-1970s, to go to the Ivory Coast. While a