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Describe the atmosphere and live music at a local pub, restaurant, festival, church or temple, club night.... inspire other people to check it out!
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Musician: Mamadou Diaw
Location: Liverpool
Instruments: vocals / percussion
Music: Senegalese mbalax
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HOW I CAME TO THIS MUSICÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýWHERE I PLAYÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýA FAVOURITE SONG |
  
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 ÌýÌýListen (5'32) to 'Nigki Nanka', performed by Mamadou Diaw and the Libidor Band, with Mamadou on vocals and percussion, Marcel Musset on Keyboards, Dave Ellis on base, Martin Robertson and Dave Gilbertson on saxophone, Brian Kelly on rhythm guitar, Martin Smith on trumpet, Tilo Pimbaum on drum, Gemma Breed and Ann Marie Howard on backing vocals.
ÌýÌýListen (1'14) to 'Nigki Nanka' performed solo by Mamadou Diaw
ÌýÌýListen (3'20) to Mamadou Diaw talk about his music
'I used to pretend I had to go to a funeral everytime the band played a gig'
How I came to this music:
My name is Mamadou Diaw. I was born in Kaolack, Senegal in West Africa in 1957. I've lived in Liverpool for 7 years.
I remember the very first time I touched a drum … I was five years old and my mother took me to a friends house full of drums. It hurt my hand when I hit it, but the sound made me happy, and despite being the only drummer in a family of 35 or 36 I knew it was what I was going to do. I played everywhere, on tables, on chairs, on the ground. Eventually when I was 10 I made my first drum out of a tomato puree tin, paper and bread. If you chew bread and make it wet, you can mould it around the edge of the tin, it sets like superglue, and makes a very good drum.
 I went to an Arabic school first, then onto a French school, before training to be a mechanic. At first I concentrated on traditional drums like djembe, sabar, timbale, and doum doum, but in the 80's modern drum kits first started to arrive in Senegal, and the local council bought one. It was what I wanted to play.
A band called "Ecole Des Arts" with 11 blind players used to come on the radio, and I found I wanted to be like them, much more than being a mechanic. I formed my own band but didn't tell my family. I used to pretend I had to go to a funeral everytime the band played a gig. One day after 7 years of not telling my family, they found out because we appeared on Senegalese television!.
Senegalese music is called mbalax, and is heavily influenced by salsa. But it's different because every salsa rhythm is the same no matter what song is being played. Mbalax has different tunes and different rhythms, but if you can dance to salsa you can dance to mbalax too. Youssou N'dour is a great influence on every Senegalese musician including me. He was the first person to combine modern drums with traditional instruments. Drums come from all over Africa and they are everywhere, people use them to communicate, to express when they're happy, or to celebrate when they're sad or distressed. Some drums are spiritual and are used to kill bad spirits.
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