Each Wednesday, The World Africa presents three new musical releases from or inspired by the continent. This week, it’s time for a fusion of styles with the Maputo Electronico trio, the Franco-Swiss quartet Ticora and the Anglo-Guinean group Pigeon.
« Electronic Maputo », by Chico Antonio, Smadj & Rhodalia Silvestre
The story begins in 2018, when Marc Brebant, director of the Franco-Mozambican Cultural Center, offers the Franco-Tunisian oudist and artistic director Jean-Pierre Smadja alias “Smadj” to come to Maputo to perform there alongside two local artists, the crooner Chico Antonio (now 63 years old) and the singer Rhodalia Silvestre (born in 1986 in Swaziland).
For ten days, the trio revisits the repertoire of “Papa Chico” with the aim of presenting this creation on stage. Then Smadj returns in 2019 to record the album, an unidentified musical object unveiled on Friday January 21 under the name of Electronic Maputo. Electronic, of course; experimental, of course.
“Masale”, by Ticora
It was under the high patronage of a Yoruba deity that the Franco-Swiss group Ticora released their first album, Rivers from Ogun, published on January 14. Born in Zurich from the meeting between the organist Cédric Schaerer, the drummer Hadrien Santos da Silva, the saxophonist Arthur Donnot and the guitarist Erwan Valazza, this formation intends “reviving the golden age of Afro-descendant music of the seventies” by summoning the mainly Nigerian genres of highlife, afrobeat and juju music, but also inspirations from the West Indies and Reunion. Like on Masalé, a cover of a piece of maloya by Patrick Manent. Or when fusion borders on syncretism.
« It’s You », de Pigeon
Another unclassifiable work, the EP Yagana, by the British group Pigeon, released in November 2021. Between disco, grunge, jazz and no wave, this first opus is inhabited by the penetrating voice of Guinean singer Falle Nioke, who arrived in the United Kingdom in 2018. In Margate, a seaside resort in the Kent (south-east), his talent met those of drummer Graham Godfrey, keyboardist Steve Pringle, guitarist Tom Dream and bassist Josh Ludlow – the first two having notably collaborated with singer of Ugandan origin Michael Kiwanuka. on the piece It’s You, Falle Nioke proclaims in English and French his sensual and furious desire, supported by the repetitive growl of a fevered bass.
Find all the musical favorites of the editorial staff in the playlist YouTube from World Africa.