Category Archives: tuareg

Mdou Moctar USA Tour 2017

After many years, we’re proud to announce the Mdou Moctar USA tour! Mdou & the band will be starting off on the EU/UK, then headed across the USA, with shows on the West Coast, Midwest, East Coast, down to the South.

I first heard Mdou’s music in 2010, and finally met him in person two years later. During the first meeting we recorded his debut album Afelan. At the time, Sahel Sounds was a nascent label taking its first stumbling steps in a tumultuous and confusing music industry, so when Mdou asked “How can I tour in America?” I responded disparagingly: “We can work together, I can help your music to travel, but I have no idea how to make a tour happen, above all in the USA.”

At select screenings, we’ll be screening our film, the Purple Rain inspired Akounak Tedalat Taha Tazoughai. But we also are talking about making a sequel of sorts, an ethnographic film from Mdou & the band as they cross America and explore what it means to tour in 2017. Maybe with a little bit of Spinal Tap thrown in. It is rock music, after all.

Zerzura premiere!

3 Replies

After a year of work, we’ve finally wrapped up our feature film Zerzura. A collaboration between Sahel Sounds and the nascent Imouhar Studio (an all purpose film/music studio in Agadez, Niger), the film is a magical journey through the Sahara, following protagonist and guitarist Ahmoudou Madassane in search for a lost city of riches. Along the way he encounters nomads, djinn, bandits, and gold seekers – a nod to our docu-realist approach to the film. While the concept of a lost desert city film has been kicking around for years, Zerzura was written, produced, and filmed entirely on location. Scenes were done in single takes, sometimes completely improvised.

Zerzura draws from our previous project Akounak Tedalat Taha Tazoughai. Where it differs is that we really ratcheted up the efforts of a collaborative approach this time and with a much larger cast and crew that shared in all the responsibilities and direction of the final project. We were also able to incorporate this collaborative spirit into post-production (with a grant from Regional Arts & Culture Council) with Ahmoudou Madassane coming to Portland, Oregon for one month, working on translation, assisting with editing, and creating a guitar heavy score for the film.

The film premieres tonight in Portland, with screenings in Niger to follow as soon as possible. Our team in Agadez awaits patiently as we get together the budget to make a portable screening that we can take back to the city, surrounding villages, and nomad camps where it was filmed. The goal of making a film that can exist and transcend cultural barrier is a difficult challenge. There are many cultural references that do not make sense in the West, but to launch into outright exposition would be a disservice to the viewers at home. Maybe in the end, like the story of Zerzura itself, everyone sees what they want in city of gold.

ZERZURA trailer from sahelsounds on Vimeo.

Sousoume Tamachek Teaser Vid

Les Filles de Illighadad Tour

Agrim Agadez – musique guitare de la republique du niger

Leave a reply

<a href="http://web.archive.org./web/20170907110841/http://sahelsounds.bandcamp.com/album/agrim-agadez" onclick="__gaTracker('send', 'event', 'outbound-article', 'http://web.archive.org./web/20170907110841/http://sahelsounds.bandcamp.com/album/agrim-agadez', 'Agrim Agadez by sahelsounds');">Agrim Agadez by sahelsounds</a>

The newest release from Sahel Sounds is titled Agrim Agadez , a compilation of field recordings of guitar music from the Sahelian empire of Niger. Focusing on guitar music throughout the country, and recorded over many years of travels, Agrim Agadez celebrates the diversity of the instrument in the contemporary Sahel.

Like most of the Sahel, the guitar is found in every corner of Niger. Whether acoustic, electric, or built by hand, guitars are highly prized possessions and continue to inspire. Every corner of Niger has particular languages, customs, and cultures, and each corner has taken the instrument and transformed it in its own special way: from bar bands of the southern Hausa land, pastoral flock owning village autodidacts, rag-tag DIY wedding rock musicians, to political minded folk guitarists. Agrim Agadez follows the sounds overheard playing on cassettes, seeking out the once legendary local heroes in their hometowns, and stumbling upon musicians in accidental chance encounters.

For readers of the blog, it’s familiar territory. Much of the music has been shared here over the years, as yours truly was faithfully updating the blog from remote cyber cafes and borrowed cellphone wi-fi. It’s also a continuation of two other records that delved into the same subject, the debut Ishilan n-Tenere, and the subsequent Laila Je T’Aime. Field recordings have always been a foundation of this work (if for anything else, an opportunity to travel!), but there is a certain element to the live recording that is hard to replicate in a controlled sterile space of the studio.

While it would be nice to claim that the record is comprehensive and academic, Agrim Agadez is not that album. This is not a record of research, but something to listen to. You can draw your own conclusions. However, it is a faithful document of the guitar as it’s heard, experienced in the open air studios of Niger with a single microphone, with backdrops of children’s voices, crickets, and village ambience. But above all, it’s a record of people who once upon a time, decided to pick up the guitar and play a song.

The record is available now on vinyl from our shop with 16 page liner notes w/ photos and bios of the bands. You can also listen/download on bandcamp.