70 generations guide Mali kora master

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BAMAKO, Mali -- On a moonlit African night in a leafy open-air bar, kora virtuoso Toumani Diabate is peeling off an ethereal flood of kaleidoscopic riffs from a 21-string cow-skin covered harp like one his forefathers have played -- for more than 70 generations.

Past a motley array of modern-day musicians and a phalanx of traditional drummers, a twirling 2 a.m. crowd of Bamako's hippest has come to pay homage to a man many regard as the greatest kora player on the planet.

The music is East meets West, past meets present, a 21st century take on ancient Malian harmonies that smacks of flamenco, Far Eastern strings and the winding legato improvisations of free-form jazz.

For Mr. Diabate, the show is much more than just music: It's the preservation of culture and tradition, a way to keep alive the spirit of the defunct Mande empire that once stretched across a vast swathe of West Africa.

Long before the region's history was recorded in books, it was told through a caste of griots, musical storytellers. Seven centuries later, the songs are still sung over powerful rhythms and haunting pentatonic scales produced on traditional instruments like the banjo-esque ngoni, the wooden xylophone-like balafon, and kora players from Guinea to Niger.

"If West Africa was a living being, the griot would be the blood," Mr. Diabate says over lunch at his Bamako home, scooping couscous and fish from a silver tray on his Persian-carpeted floor. "As griots, we are the memory, we are the link between society and the past."

Born in Bamako in the mid-1960s-- he doesn't know exactly when -- Mr. Diabate began playing the kora at age 5.

Formally educated for only about 10 years, he was debilitated in his youth by a disease that shriveled his right leg and forces him to walk with a crutch. Yet he went on to stardom, revered by listeners thousands of miles away and idolized at home.

The first kora player to win a Grammy remains humble and infinitely good-natured, never too busy to shake the hand of a fan, even while he's performing.

In 1987, he recorded his debut CD, a renowned acoustic solo work called "Kaira," meaning "peace."