PETER MAKURUBE meets West African music man and griot Adama Drame, who is visiting South Africa with his troupe of singers and drummers
WHEN he was born he joined a long line of great musical tradition – the Djeli griots (musicians) had been at it for six generations. Adama Drame was totally immersed in the sounds of the region of Malinke.
Unlike his father, Adama had some say in the matter. His father was the only son. He had to play. In Burkina Faso only men play the drums because, as Drame says: “They think women can’t cope with the ferocity, dazzling speed and sheer physical power required to play the type of music the Mandinka people have been playing for centuries. And what’s more, the gigs go on all night. No lapse in tempo will be tolerated.”
Drame senior made no mistake. He fathered 10 boys. That’s making sure. Adama was the only one who showed any interest in what his father was doing. He duly went through the obligatory play-all-your-waking- moments-and-do-nothing-else. To be a griot you have to possess dedication, discipline and single-mindedness.
Drame remembers that in those days Western influence was creeping into the region. He was only 12 when he first started out and was playing in his father’s band, which had a horn section. His father played the accordion and guitar very well and could afford to be versatile. “There was always food and clothing and a better life. All through music. He could afford to look after us all,” he says. He developed a healthy respect for what his dad was doing and the great musician he was “lucky to play with”.
He developed into an accomplished percussionist in the good, but tough, school of griots under his father’s tutelage. “My father would expect me to play all night long without stopping.” But he persevered and grew to be a force in his own right.
Drame plays an assortment of drums, among them the tchoun, a big, round, wooden drum that is attached around the waist, weighs about 20kg and is a typical instrument of Segou (Mali); the bongolo, a long percussion instrument played with a stick; and the tama, better known as the “talking drum”.
He’s been all over the world playing to a wide variety of audiences, but that has not influenced his original traditional sound. “Some people make music to appeal to white people … to please them. So they improvise and change things to suit the Western ear. It always collapses … and dies fast,” says Drame, when asked about the response to his music in Europe. “If people come to watch me they must be prepared to do a bit of work. To try and understand what I’m doing.” He once wondered about modifying the music, like so many others in Africa, but, out of respect for “my tradition, my father and my own love for the music”, decided against it.
His music has been heard in Antwerp, in a gig featuring Mahlatini and the Mahotella Queens, Thomas Mapfumo, Oumou Sangare and many others. That collaboration has spawned an album called Et la Foliba, which contains a track dedicated to Madiba – Percussion pour Mandela. The group has toured extensively in America and Europe and is here as part of the inter-African cultural exchange that is so vital to reintroducing South Africans to the rest of the continent.
He brings with him five percussionists, one balafon player and two female singers, whose role is central to the music. As Adama says: “The music does not exist in isolation, it needs the words to tell the story.”
The master percussionist with a passion for African heritage has a message for African politicians: “Learn about the economic possibilities music can bring. Try to accommodate musicians for the development of people and for the preservation of culture.” He says musicians should get together and be one force. That way they can collectively “show them the benefits of not cutting the arts and culture budget first when the country has problems”.
Adama Drame and his group will conduct workshops on Friday June 27, at 2pm. They will perform on Saturday June 28, at the Mega Music warehouse in Johannesburg