Tall, black and wearing the vibrant colours of his African home, Amadou Fall and two longtime friends carry messages of love and peace in their music.
Fall, guitarist and vocalist Ibrahim Ba and drummer extraordinaire Abdul Sow were one of many big hits at this year’s Roots and Blues Festival.
Friends since childhood, the three artists now call California home and travel the world, with return trips to their native Senegal to recharge their batteries.
Asked why he is never without a broad, happy smile, Fall’s friends are quick to say “he is always like that.”
“My mission is to remind people to be happy,” he says, agreeing that while many in his native country have far fewer material things, they are by nature happier.
His reasoning for why North Americans often seem to lack that happy outlook?
“They don’t know the gifts God gives them.”
Like Kenyan-born Naomi Wachira, Fall says the focus on time and materialism are replaced by relationships with people and a gratefulness for life itself in his country. And, like Naomi Wachira, he says it takes time to shake off the trappings and stress of North America when he goes home.
“Why get mad and stressed? We are all going in the same direction – to the grave,” he said, with a wide smile. “Whatever you have is staying here.”
In much the traditional way of North America’s indigenous peoples, respect for oneself and others begins at home.
“If your mom and dad are happy, you are taught that at home and you take it out into the world,” says Sow emphatically, pointing out that respect is always given to elders, who are cared for by their children when they age. “They keep you when you are young and when they are old, they come back to you.”
The idea is illustrated in one of the songs Ba sang at the Boogie Barn-N on Saturday.
Woven through their artistry is the men’s belief that music destroys all that separates human beings – colour, race, language and religion.
Fall produces exquisite sound from his Kora, an intriguing 21-stringed African instrument, made from wood, a gourd and cow skin.
His answer to why he plays the native instrument is simple.
“The kora called me.”
And, with kora, native drums, guitar and vocals, the trio use their music to “bring what’s good in Africa and connect with people in North America.”
Devout Muslims, the men say that like the Bible, the Koran contains no references to killing others and that to be a good Muslim means accepting all others’ religions.
On the matter of ISIS and the turmoil in the Middle East, Sow leans forward and declares firmly “that is culture, not religion.”
He tells of two cemeteries in his native town – one Muslim and one Christian and says, every year, the Muslims go and tend to the Christian cemetery and the Christians go to do the same to the Muslim one.
“We are meant to live in peace and love and accept everything,” he says.
And that, he says, can be brought about by music, which heals all.
When the trio plays at extended care homes in California, people who have been sitting almost comatose, are drawn by the music to get up, go outside and get involved.
It was the same music that drew enthusiastic crowds at the 23rd annual Roots and Blues Festival.