Biography
The Orchestre National de Barbès honors its members’ Algerian roots, which for many represent their actual homeland, while simultaneously embracing the neighborhood of Barbès in Paris—a self-contained “little Algeria” that functions as both residence and cultural sphere. The ensemble traces its beginnings to 1985, when Algerian-based bassist Youcef Boukalla cut a cassette with his group T34. Circulating in Paris, the recording became an underground favorite among the Algerian diaspora and earned praise from artists such as Takfarinas and Cheb Mami. Boukalla relocated to the French capital on the strength of that success and went on to release four albums of rai and rock alongside vocalist Larbi Dida, later issuing the solo album Salam in 1994. Around the same period Fateh Benlala fled Algeria’s unrest for Paris, and Moroccan Sufi percussionist Aziz Sahmouni likewise settled there. Once in the city the musicians converged, recruiting additional percussionist Kamel Tenfiche to form the core of Orchestre National de Barbès. Further players, both French and North African, joined the lineup, and the collective rehearsed intensively to develop its distinctive fusion of Maghrebi groove and Franco-funk before taking the music to festivals nationwide. A performance captured live at Paris’s Agory Theater supplied the material for the band’s first release, En Concert, which established the group on the world-music scene and generated international bookings, among them a short U.S. tour in summer 1998. The follow-up album Poulina appeared in 1999; although the band has produced no further recordings, the two earlier albums were later packaged together as a two-fer in France in 2000.
Albums
