Kakande – Dununya (from Dununya)

nowadays, cello to balafon, Brooklyn.

and then, guitar as balafon, 1970s Guinea.

Download audio file (13_Balla et ses Balladins_Sakhodougou.mp3)

Balla et ses Balladins – Sakhodougou (from The Syliphone Years, buyable here or here)

You can think about a song – a good song – as a miraculous moment when all the dissonances that frame a person’s life drop out of sight long enough to see how it looks without them. So when a band you like hits that groove, sometimes all you can do is listen, because that moment will be leaving.