Afel Bocoum

For over thirty years Afel Bocoum served as a core musician in the ensemble led by Ali Farka Toure. His own first album under his name, Alkibar: Messenger of the Great River, appeared in 1999 and marked his initial emergence as a solo artist. The sessions took place beside the Niger River during a brief five-day pause while work continued on Toure’s recording Niafunke. Finger-picked guitar lines and expressive vocals sung in Sonrai, Fula, and Tamashek were placed over an instrumental palette that included lute, monochord njurkle, calabash, spike fiddles, and a three-voiced choir. The BBC characterized the performances as “gentler than the stabbing blues style of Ali Farka Toure. Bocoum’s sound is poly-rhythmic, warm, and enchanting with simple magnetic melodies and hummable choruses.” Born to a father who played both njoika and njurkle, Bocoum joined Toure at thirteen in the Troupe Musicale De Niafunke. He departed the ensemble in 1975 to pursue agricultural studies at M’Pessoba in South Mali, yet rejoined his earlier teacher during the early 1980s when Toure formed the group Asko.