Salif Keita

So Good to be Back Home!

Paris 

14/10/2005 - 

Salif Keita is through with flying overseas and buying time in other people's studios. The Malian music star is finally back home where he belongs, making his latest album in his own studio in Bamako. Recorded in the same acoustic spirit as his last album, M'Bemba is redolent with the rich flavours of home cooking. RFI Musique hooks up with a globe-trotting star who shows no regrets about returning to base.

RFI Musique: This wasn't the first time you recorded in the studio you set up in Bamako, was it? I believe you worked there in 1999 on several tracks on your album Papa...
Salif Keita: Yes, that's right, but we weren't actually able to use those tracks in the end. Once we got to the U.S., where we went to finish the album, we realised there were certain technical incompatibilities that meant the recordings we'd made in Mali didn't work. Basically, the studio equipment wasn't up to scratch. But since then I've refitted the entire studio. Now, it's a really good studio with the latest in cutting-edge technology! Before I worked on M'Bemba there, we recorded a number of hot new up-and-coming talents from Mali and Guinea. Richard Bona used the studio, too, when he came to do a duet with me, a song called Kalabancoro that featured on his last album Munia (released in 2003).

So what's it like recording back home? Does it put a whole new slant on things?
It's absolutely vital because you get to play in an ideal environment. You've got traditional musicians to hand and everything's a lot, lot easier. You don't have trouble with filing requests for visas, then undergoing all those interminable  checks afterwards. You don't have to deal with problems of how you're going to get around, what you're going to eat, and where you're going to stay ... And the great thing is you're not tied to any particular schedule. You've got the key to the studio - and that means if you get a sudden burst of inspiration at two in the morning you can open up the studio and get down to work!

You lived in Abidjan, in Ivory Coast, between 1978 and 1983, and after that you moved to the Paris region in 1984. At what point did you decide you were going to go back to Mali?
Well, in actual fact, I made a first attempt to go back home in 1991, but things were pretty complicated. When you've lived abroad as an expat for all those years and acquired a very different experience of life, there are inevitably a few issues when you go home. There are things that those who've stayed behind can't understand. And then you're bombarded on all sides with people wanting things from you. You have to learn to slow down and communicate properly again.

Do you think there were more advantages or disadvantages to living away from home? Did inspiration ever threaten to dry up when you couldn't draw nourishment from your roots?
I did the right thing leaving, I'm sure of that. It was very much the right decision for me at the time, but coming back home was the right thing for me to do, too. I did the right thing leaving for Abidjan, but then I stayed away too long. I decided to come back to Mali for good in 2001. I still come over to France every now and then, but just to deal with specific things at a time. Then I turn round and go straight back home. Before, I used to flit back and forth between France and Mali all the time. I'd never let a year go by without going home a couple of times!

What do you think Mali's good points are today?
Well, for a start, I've got every confidence in the current president. He's the best president we've ever had, in fact. He's honest and he's a patriot who knows how to prepare the country for a better future. And that's why I went back to live in Mali, you know. The current president's apolitical. He doesn't belong to any particular party and he's set up a government based on national union. Mali is a great example of a country where democracy works. It's a peaceful country, too, and that's saying something these days!

Did the president try and encourage you to return at any point, offering you support and/or collaboration?
No. Anyway, I wouldn't have gone for that. I don't like to be on those kind of terms with people. I've never got involved with politics at all.

So we're not likely to see Salif Keita recruited as Malian Minister of Culture one day? 
The idea's never even crossed my mind! There's one thing I would like to do, though, and that is get back out in the field like Ali Farka Touré. I'm maybe going to buy some tractors and start working the land.

What, you mean you'd give up music to do that?
I pray to God that I won't end up a musician, because that's not what my parents wanted for me. Out of respect for them, I'd like to end my days according to their wishes, by being a good farmer. I've got a few fields and I've started breeding fish now, too. I love life out in the bush. I'm a bushman at heart! Bamako's never been my kind of place. The pollution's unbearable. There's nothing I hate in life so much as cities. The countryside is heaven compared to city life. Sitting down and eating the fish or chickens that you've raised, getting out there and tending your crops, that's enough for me. What the hell is someone like me going to do in a city? I love the countryside. That's what makes me tick. As for the business I've got in Bamako, the recording studio and my club, Le Moffou, my children are grown-up now and they can take care of that.

How would you describe Mali to someone who doesn't know the first thing about it?
It's a very old country with a rich traditional culture. It's a peaceful country run along democratic lines. And I'd encourage anyone to go there because Mali is like a house that's in the process of being built. And you're better off visiting a house that's going up rather than a house that's burning down!

Salif Keita M'Bemba (Universal Music France) 2005

Salif Keita will be kicking off a European tour on 25 October 2005      

Patrick  Labesse

Translation : Julie  Street