Bio

Fula Brothers are a burst of unbridled, creative musicianship and happy-making. A high-spirited meeting of veteran performers from West Africa and America, each with a history of innovation and collaboration. Together they weave West African hunter’s harp, fingerstyle guitar, drums, vocals, and a bounty of improvisation into an ecstatic groove-based dialogue, which the heart – and the feet – cannot resist.

Master kamale ngoni player, Mamadou Sidibe, is from the Wassoulou region of Mali, West Africa. Twenty-five years ago, Mamadou played a groundbreaking role in the transformation of this region’s music from its origins in hunters’ sacred melodies – played on six string donso ngoni (hunter’s harps) – to a music of philosophical observations, politics, and daily life. Mamadou was one of the first to expand the instrument’s range with two extra strings, creating the popular kamale ngoni. He has recently enhanced the kamale ngoni even further by devising 10 and 12-stringed instruments. “At the center of his music is the same sensibility that you’ll find in Muddy Waters: a sense of music as a tool for the re-creation of everyday life into something special, even magical.” -Stylus.
Fingerstyle guitarist Walter Strauss’s multi-layered style draws on American roots, jazz, classical, and cultural guitar traditions. But what makes his playing utterly unique is how it is informed by other global stringed instruments. He has delved deep into the harp traditions of West Africa, integrating elements of their richly layered styles and rhythmic sensibilities with his own and rendering traditional pieces on the guitar. In addition to his solo CDs and performances across the US and UK, Walter’s collaborations have spanned an impressive range of musicians, from maverick multi-instrumentalist, Joe Craven, and Grammy-winning Malian kora player, Mamadou Diabate, to Scottish fiddler, Johnny Hardie, and Grammy-nominated guitar maestro, Alex de Grassi. “A many-layered, multi-textured, one-man folk festival.” -Maverick Magazine.