Tag: Ballaké Sissoko

Sissoko, Segal, Parisien, Peirani: Les Égarés review – an awesome foursome

This stellar quartet channel a multitude of influences to irresistible effect

By John Fordham

The French cellist Vincent Segal is one of those peripatetic players who shows up across the musical frontier: on albums by Sting or “barefoot diva” Cesária Évora, on an arthouse film score or a dancefloor remix of Bumcello, the duo he formed with drummer Cyril Atef almost a quarter of a century ago. Segal’s most feted collaboration remains with Malian kora master Ballaké Sissoko on Chamber Music (2009) and Musique de Nuit (2015), where they pulled the traditions of Africa and Europe into a seductive neoclassical fusion.

Here, the pair are joined by accordionist Vincent Peirani and soprano sax player Émile Parisien on a venture that proves just as irresistible, even if its title translates as The Lost. It’s a sprightly, restless set, with Segal’s plucked cello providing a thrumming heartbeat to what is a communal, improvisational approach. There are reflective pieces – Sissoko’s Ta Nyé and Banja bookend the record in flurries of kora – but more typical is the group’s reworking of the late Joe Zawinul’s Orient Express, while on Esperanza the quartet seem to be channelling a drunken Colombian cumbia. Although inflected by various accents – there’s a Balkan feel to Izao, a touch of John Coltrane to Parisien’s sax – this is truly fusion music.

Watch the video for Esperanza by Sissoko Segal Parisien Peirani.

Source: Sissoko Segal Parisien Peirani: Les Égarés review – an awesome foursome | Music | The Guardian

Beauty during pandemic: Ballaké Sissoko and Vincent Segal at the Vienne Jazz festival

Embark on a poetic journey around the world with the kora player Ballaké Sissoko and the cellist Vincent Segal at the Jazz festival in Vienna.

It was in 2009 that the two virtuosos joined forces for the first time on the album “Chamber Music”. Six years later, their new project “Night music”, conceived in Bamako and inspired by Mandingo, Baroque, Brazilian, jazz and Gypsy music, is a real instrumental conversation. 
Moment of sweetness with Ballaké Sissoko and Vincent Segal on the stage of the Théâtre Antique!

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The Jazz Festival in Vienna
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Ballaké Sissoko et Vincent Segal

The very first time I heard the magnificent musical dialogue between Ballaké Sissoko and Vincent Segal  – I was blown away by the beautiful mating of sounds between the kora and cello.

Here’s what Songlines says about the latest recording from this unique artist collaboration:

Ballaké Sissoko is one of Mali’s great kora players and Vincent Segal is a French cellist and producer of remarkable refinement. Their debut, Chamber Music, was one of Jo Frost’s picks of 2010 and this is just as good – perhaps better as the duo have performed together so much they seem to respond to each other instinctively. The contrast of plucked and bowed strings is much of the magic, although Segal is frequently playing pizzicato or creating percussive or flute-like sounds on his cello. The title comes from the fact that much of the album was atmospherically recorded at nighttime on Sissoko’s rooftop in Bamako. SB

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