Jali Mawdo Suso

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“My name is Mawdo Suso I am a jali and I want to tell something about me. I was born in Sutukoba, in the Wully Kanape Region (Wully is the name of an ancient kingdom which included the territories that go from the upper river bank of the Gambia through to Senegal towards Mali, including the city of Tamba Kounda, ndr). My ancestors were griots from the Waali family, the last kings of Gabu (Janke Waali was the king of Gabu at the time when the kingdom had to subjugate to the Peuls who were headed by Alpha Yaya, nrd). It was the Pheuls who made us move to Fode Kunda, the city I left when I go married. From Fode Kunda I married Sami. The origins of my family come from a region with two names; Fode Kunda Wully and Waali Kunda, those were our aristocrats (kunda means “the house of”, ndr). Today we serve El Hadji Seni Sunhateh, his brother, his sisters and his children. We came to Sukta Sabiji in order to stay close to them.

One of my ancestors was Siriman Sansan. Siriman came from the East and had a son named Tamba Jali. Tamba Jali had many wives and children; one of them was named Jontan Suso. Jaliya is diffuses like seeds. Thanks to this inheritance one can have something to live on. When we, as jali go visit our nobles they give us everything, clothes, animals, food and even money. We usually never ask for anything. If someone wants to really do something for you but has no means, he can’t do it, for this reason we don’t ask for anything. Those who have the means to thank the jali can offer them anything, also horses, donkeys, sheep, clothing”. (Interview to Jali Mawdo Suso , Gambia , 2010. Translation by Pape Kanoute).


Mawdo Suso
Mawdo Suso is the greatest living balafon player in Gambia . The Mandingo music in Gabu did not channel through the disco graphic industry filter like it has instead happened to many musicians in Mali . Probably also for this reason the music sounds more rough, rural and primordial. The Gambian kora doesn’t linger in sighing melodies, just like the balafon of Mawdo that vibrates proud of its dirty dissonances, dear to the African esthetical. The voices are cavernous and broken and often they let themselves go to develop a ritual dialogue where the jalis singing acts as echo to another jali who responds, approves and thanks. The polyrhythms are free and complicated; the songs are long and hypnotizing. It is a hard experience to listen to the music from Gabu, an experience that can become intoxicating and evocative.


Ousmane Suso
As soon as we arrived in Serrekunda we met Yusuf the oldest sibling of Mawdo’s family. Yusuf together with his brother Ousmane – balafon and kora – have enchanted us for a whole evening. It was not the mastery of technique and virtuosism of their solos that have overwhelmed us but also the freedom of their creativity, a proneness and a desire to explore sounds and new harmonies starting off by their deep knowledge and respect for tradition and for their ancient jaliya.


Mawdo Suso
So the following day we are at Mawdo’s house, in one of Serrekunda’s suburbs, without electricity. It is called Sukuta Sabiji. Jimba’s Peujeot struggles to arrive over the dusty roads that cross some fields. We enter and we are loaded with greetings and smiles from young people and children. Balafon everywhere.


jalimuso in Susokunda
“In my family we all play balafon, it is a jaly inheritance. Me, I was born with the balafon. I started playing when I was small, when I was seven and today I have passed on the tradition to my children. The balafon is an instrument that has had its own evolution. In the ancient times it only had 15 cursor keys, and then it reached 17. Today the balafon has 21 keys and its potentials have much increased. We inherit the knowledge of the family but we have surpassed our fathers, just like our children will go beyond us. Knowledge extends always forward.


Mawdo Suso
To bring forth the jaliya requires respect for the costumes and for traditions. Each country has its own traditions. If there is no respect for the costumes one can not achieve peace. Young people need to respect aged people so do the sons and daughters need to respect their parents. The jeliya that we are transmitting from father to son means exactly this.


Jali Fune Kuyateh
I have not travelled much throughout Africa , only Gambia and Senegal . While I have been often to Europe ; England , Holland , Belgium , Germany , Austria , France , Spain and Switzerland and also in the States. Travelling is like studying, it makes you be aware of things directly. He who travels sees everything, and he does not limits himself to knowing only what others say. Although I have not travelled much in Africa , I have known other styles of African music because I have met many African musicians in Europe and I have played together with them. Once upon a time there was no chance of listening to recorded music but today there is also the television. I have also discovered other music by travelling.


Jali Fatoumata Suso
Also my wives are jails, daughters of jails. My first wife is Jali Fune Kuyateh and her sister has married El Hadji Lamine Suso and is mother of Jimba Suso who has accompanied you to my house. We are one single family”.


Ousmane, Mawdo, Yusuf
Notwithstanding that Mawdo Suso is an icon of Gambian music; he welcomes us in his house with simplicity and with an open smile. Just after the presentations he sits behind his balafon and starts playing, accompanied by Yusuf and Ousmane. Together they generate a storm of rhythms. His wives, Jali Fune Kuyateh and Coumba Suso, sing a powerful chant and the young daughters let themselves go to some elegant dance. The kindness of this family shapes with this extraordinary show for which we were not prepared and while the sun sets quickly the musical thunderstorm calms down just in the same way it had started.


Wully Band
We are dazed, Yusuf smiles happily. He warned us about his father being a master and now we witness this. We will return tomorrow, we want to record both him and the Wully Band, the modern orchestra formed by Yusuf, about whom we will write, notwithstanding the fame and success that they obtain locally they still have not managed to leave behind a testimonial recording. But most of all we wish to spend more time in this house so full of culture, art and life, where parents and children live happily, proudly and in love together.


Wallai Records mixer

Listening Notes:

1. Kaira (Wallai Records)
Mawdo Suso: balafon
Yusuf Suso: balafon
Mohammed Suso: balafon
Fune Kuyateh: voice
Coumba Suso: voice
Wallai Records, january 2010, Sukuta Sabiji, Serrekunda, Gambia.

2. Ginamuso (Wallai Records)
Yusuf Suso: balafon
Wallai Records, january 2010, Sukuta Sabiji, Serrekunda, Gambia.

3. Tunko Darbo (Jaliology)
Dembo Konte: kora and voice
Kausu Kuyateh: kora and voice
Mawdo Suso: balafon and voice
Tratto da Jaliology, Xenophile, 1995
Mawdo Suso composition for Tunko Darbo, one of his patron from Fodekunda.

4. Ke Koto Mani (Chedo) (Jaliology)
Dembo Konte: kora and voice
Kausu Kuyateh: kora and voice
Mawdo Suso: balafon and voice
Tratto da Jaliology, Xenophile, 1995
Kora classic, tells the story of Janke Waali, last king of Gabu.

5. Lambango (Jaliology)
Mawdo Suso: balafon and voice
Tratto da Jaliology, Xenophile, 1995
Ancient manden classic.

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The path of respect

LISTEN: (Look at "Notes for Listening")


Senegambia is the name with which Gambians call Kololi, one the most beautiful beaches where white tourists meet, mainly women coming mostly from northern Europe . “Big big mama Africa ”, says laughing Jemba’s young friend while we sit around a plate of cus and fish, “enormous tourists who weigh more than hundred kilos. During the day they sun bath and during the night they want to have fun at the disco. No traditional music for them, neither kora nor balafon, only boom boom fire fire. . . . .”. He laughs and so do we without understanding whether he is conscious of the hidden meaning behind his words. He says he’s fifteen but looks at least eighteen. He has a beautiful face, strong sculptured muscles beneath a shiny skin and his laughter is contagious . . . .

Yusuf Suso
After having left Casamance we arrive in Serrekunda, an open city and full of life. It develops close to the Atlantic beaches, a few kilometers from Banjul . The atmosphere is a little Jamaican, a down beat improvising sound system echoed in the air from a not far street on going party. We had just finished eating and in the courtyard of Ibu’s house, yet to be finished, where we are guests, comes Yusuf Suso with his balafon over his shoulders together with his brother Ousmane. Somebody from Italy must have told them about our arrival and they came to greet us with their music. The young beach - disco boy tonight seems happy and at ease, maybe because he well understands that he will not need any “boom boom fire fire”.


children of Serrekunda
The bomsa boys and girls are willing to make flabby, mature and fat tourists who crowd the luxurious armoured hotels of the coast, attracted by the sun, by the sea and by the exotic landscapes, but also by that young flesh that in their own countries are unable to consume. For the bomsa the toubabs – white people – are a very easy way to make money which their parents would earn in one month of hard work. The Gambia is a sexual paradise for those tourists and the show that waits for us during our short visit to the Palma Rima beach leaves us embarrassed. “Let’s go” whispers surprisingly Margherita, while we walk under the warm sun between the palms. What doesn’t belong to us about the way toubabs have of living Africa , those who lay on sun beds of the Senegambia beach?


cocktail
The question does not come from moral values which we think do not belong to us, but more from the great value we give and from respect. Wherever in the old continent, on the beaches of Gambia , in the streets of an African city, the relationship between a white person and a black person, always struggles to find a balance, because it vacillates under the weight of the cultural differences of income and from the heritage of history. When a European like us steps into Africa , even if unconsciously, he carries with him this weight on his shoulders. Independently from what he thinks or from what he believes, he will always be seen as a walking wallet and he will generate fear and respect. This is a consequence of the fact that the roles of domination and submission have knackered out the popular identity and the people’s identity. For those who are careful; experience confirms this continuously.


Vulture
For people similar to us, who believe to have an interest and true feeling and consequently the intention to learn from Africa , to look for an attitude that will free us at least partly from those dynamics, becomes an firm necessity. Here is how we came to modify our approach, letting ourselves go, but at the same observing carefully and imitating their way of being together, to understand which words and which gestures are appropriate within each context. Practicing we manage to give the right value to gestures and words that in our culture are senseless and slowly slowly our sensitivity adjusts to this way of being, we feel at ease and we realize that the barriers of difference crumble. When this happens communication becomes more fluid and deep and new feelings originate.


Children at Serrekunda
It is difficult to explain and to some it may also sound out of place but we returned from Gabu with the sensation of having found a modality which we feel belongs to us and that brings us afar from the toubab beaches and from the bomsa, bringing us closer to the heart of black people. This time more than the other times we feel to have lived Africa in a natural way, with respect, trust, love, patience and free from expectations. I am simply talking about brotherhood a type of relationship we are learning from Africans for whom the family is not simply defined by genetics but by attitudes. For them a brother or sister is he who has proven to deserve trust, also if his skin is white. “Many white people have come to this house, have pronounced nice words, have enjoyed our hospitality and have recorded our music. But when back to their countries they never contacted us. But we have seen you are respectful and after having listened to those who know you from a long time, we believe you are different. For this reason today we are very very happy.”


Jimba e Mawdo Suso
If they were happy we were happier. With love we believe to have found the beginning of a path that will bring us to discover Africa and also ourselves.


Eagle


Notes for listening

La Kambeng Band - in mandika means unity – the group was created in Birikama, by Ebrima Jobarteh, son of the famous Gambian kora player Amadou Bansang Jobarteh. Presently Kambeng Band plays every Sunday in Senegambia Beach Hotel. The tracks are from the album Yeriinaa.
Tracks:
1. Sabari Mussolu
2. Kumuna
3. Tabanga (Tubaka)
4. Konkoto

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