Biography
Ba Cissoko was born in 1967 in Guinea Bissao, the son of griot Kandara Cissoko, one of the founders of the Ballet Djoliba of Guinea.
In 1989, he decided to live in Conakry to improve his kora playing with M'bady Kouyaté, one of the great pioneers of the Mandingue Kingdom. He met there Kourou Kouyaté aka ‘Kourou bass’, one of M’bady’s sons. From 1993 to 1995, they worked together and in 1998 they performed at MASA, in Abidjan. In 1999, Ba Cissoko created a trio with the young kora player Sekou Kouyaté (brother of Kourou) who brought traditional instruments towards new sounds. Ibrahim Bah, a Conakry street child, who played the djembé on the beach of Conakry, soon joined them. The current band was formed in 2001.
The compositions of the band took root in Africa and grew rich through different musical influences.
Starting with the Festival Nuits Metis in La Ciotat, they have had a long practise of stage shows ranging from their Marseilles cubbyhole to large festivals always giving impressive performances.
Now they have come up with ‘Sabolan’ released in October 2003, an incandescent album produced by eclectic Malagasy musician and producer Tao Ravao. This album is full of emotions, generosity and talent. It is a really good piece of young modern African music but you must absolutely see them on stage too! The band is actually completely amazing on stage mostly thanks to Sekou Kouyaté who is a fantastic stage performer, plugging his kora on different electric pedals and performing like a true rock star. To discover absolutely!