So Kono

Salif Keita was supposed to have stopped recording. The singer-songwriter, nicknamed the ‘African Caruso’ and the ‘Golden Voice of Mali’, had announced as much in November 2018, shortly after releasing Un Autre Blanc, his alleged swansong. But Keita, 75, continued performing his slick blend of blues, jazz and traditional Mande music, sometimes in his Bamako club Mouffou, sometimes internationally. In spring 2023, he played Japan’s Kyotophonie festival, accompanied by ngoni player Badie Tounkara and Mamadou Kone on calabash. This acoustic trio features on a few tracks here. So Kono means ‘inside the chamber’, a sentiment befitting the stripped-down arrangements and medium-fi production of a work that was mostly recorded in a Kyoto hotel room. There’s a lightness of touch to each of the album’s nine jewel-like tracks, among them ‘Laban’ from 2005’s M’Bemba; ‘Tassi’, a new song for healing, all tremulous vocals and chiming female harmonies; and ‘Kanté Manfila’, an ode to one of Africa’s greatest guitarists, and a mentor who propelled Salif’s journey from Les Ambassadeurs to the international spotlight, collaborating on albums such as M’Bemba and Mouffou along the way. It’s beautifully effortless, all of it, strafed with gently finger-picked chords and impassioned lyrical bursts, and a work for listening to while reclining on silk pillows, a warm breeze ruffling your hair.