The Mozart of Senegalese bass releases his 5th album Sultan. He came to the Grand studio as a trio in the #SessionLive with Dharyl Esso on bass and Tony Tixier on keyboard / piano, to perform 2 tracks from this album which brings together West Africa, North Africa and the Middle East.
Four years after his last solo album African Fast Food, Alune Wade returns for a bewitching musical journey between West Africa and North Africa, surrounded by long-time accomplices and newcomers, including Noura Mint Seymali, Paco Sery, Cyril Atef, Hugues Mayot and Christian Sands and Harold López -Nussa… Since his first solo album, Mbolo, released in 2006, Alune Wade continues to weave an intuitive jazz framework. Bassist, author, composer, performer and producer, with Aziz Sahmaoui, he formed the group University of Gnawa in 2010, with which he explored the secrets of the Gnawa trance on all the major stages of the world. The two musicians are among those who have played with Joe Zawinul and participated in the cosmopolitan interbreeding dear to the Viennese keyboardist and pianist. In 2015, Wade participates in the Marcus Miller album Afrodeezia (Blue Note) and recorded with Cuban pianist Harold López-Nussa, Havana-Paris-Dakar (World Village/Harmonia Mundi). The soundtrack, carved in Havana, testifies to their common vision and the inspiration drawn from each city.
In 2018, the bassist produced African Fast Fooda fourth album that already crosses languages, rhythms, jazz, afrobeat and folk, by now surrounding itself with a palette of musicians, from many countries, who each time compose a new musical space.
This fifth album presents itself as a musical journey between West Africa and North Africa, which stretches languidly to East Africa and Ethiopia, guided by Arab-African rhythms. Andalusians, Berbers or the breath of Sufi songs, and mixing the coppery flavors of afrobeat with the flights of oriental maqams and jazz. These are the paths bordered by the seas and the sands, which lead from Granada to Oran, from Tunis to Timbuktu, from Dakar to the foothills of the kingdom of Saba. Between strength and mystery, warrior rhythms or bewitching charms, Sultan unfolds epics of founding myths of the African continent that occur at the crossroads of burning topical stories, where journeys become clandestine and murderous migrations, where hot sands hide the black gold that sets men’s hearts on fire. But where interbreeding and tolerance can also be expressed at random in a café in Oran. The initiatory journeys are winding, marked by troubled detours and luminous passages. Scattered with dangers or gleaming treasures, they flush out inner riches, rediscover ancestral wisdom through the meanders of mourning or oblivion. And always exalt the feelings living in the shadow of beautiful souls. Twelve titles like so many stories. And a dizzying cast. In the first circle of musicians on stage: Adriano Tenorio DD on percussion, Cédric Ducheman on piano and keyboards, Carlos Sarduy on trumpet, Hugues Mayot on saxophone and Daril Esso on drums. On the album, we will recognize no less than nineteen renowned names, each in their field, drummer, singer, rapper, flautist, trombonist, oud player, guembri player, etc. You have to look for the names of Paco Sery, Cyril Atef, Lenny White, Josh Dutsh, Ismail Lumanovski, Hein Benmiloud, Mustapha Sahbi, Nasriddine Chebli, Harold Lopez Nussa, Christian Sands, Leo Genovese, Bobby Spark, Daniel Blake, Faris Ishaq and all the others, to better hear the voices of Nora Mint Seymali, Mounir Troudi, PPS the Writah, Aziz Sahmaoui, Mehdi Nassouli or Djam. There is no coincidence among those who take part in the journey orchestrated by Alune Wade, which begins with the emblematic procession of the Queen of Sheba. The epic begins head-on in a roll of drums before ending in a port city between musicians who know the meaning of the word prodigy.
► New album Sultan (Enja Yellow Bird / The Other Cast)
Titles performed at the Grand studio
Saba’s Journey Live RFI
Portrait of Moor feat. Noura Mint Seymali, from the album Sultan
Dalaka Live RFI
Line Up: Alune Wadebass, vocal, Dharil EssobatteryTony Tixierkeyboards, piano.
Sound: Fabien Mugneret, Mathias Taylor.
Alune Wade Playlist
Black Hole Chris Dave Feat. Anderson Paak
Gelel baaba maal