Sweet Sounds of the Sahel at Tropicalia: Mali + Mauritania = 1

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Bambara, Festival in the Desert, Leila Gobi, Mali music, Mamadou Kelly, Mauritania music, Menaka, Noura Mint Seymali, Timbuktu, Tropicalia, Tuareg music

Last night I attended Tropicalia’s ‘Festival in the Desert’ with the Mauritanian Diva, Noura Mint Seymali, Mamadou Kelly, an ethnic Bambara from the Timbuktu Region of Mali, and Leila Gobi, from Menaka, in the Gao Region of Mali, an area which saw a lot of fighting between Tuareg separatists and Islamist militants.

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Movie Review – The Last Song Before the War (Malian Music)

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Al-Maamoun Keita, Andrea Pappito, Cheick Hamala Diabate, Essakane Film, Last Song Before the War, Mali Festival in the Desert, Mali music, Manny Ansar, Supernova, Timbuktu, Tuareg music

Last night, I sat through a surprisingly good film (in amazingly uncomfortable seats at the Navy Memorial Theatre) on Mali’s Festival in the Desert, which was held annually from 2001 until the conflict in Mali forced the cancellation of the 2013 edition.  You can read the background on how The Last Song Before the War came to fruition in the Washington City Paper.