Ali Farka Toure, 67; Malian Guitarist Was Hailed in U.S. as the `Desert Bluesman'

Before the blues arrived in the Mississippi Delta, it lived in the desert of Mali, West Africa, and was known by a different name.

The sound of Ali Farka Toure was like the DNA that proved the paternity of the music, a link between the people and places that claimed it as their own.

"I've stayed in the tradition, and they've evolved in exile," he said of African American bluesmen who observers wrongly assumed had influenced his playing. "It's very important that these musicians go back to Africa to see where the music comes from, because in that way they'll find the origins, the roots of their music."

Toure, the two time-Grammy Award winner, the musician dubbed "the desert bluesman" and hailed by many as Africa's finest guitarist, died in his sleep Tuesday of bone cancer at his home in Mali. Though Toure did not know the exact date of his birth, he believed his age to be 67.

"It's impossible to calculate the importance of John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters and now Ali Farka Toure," Bonnie Raitt, who played with Toure, told The Times on Tuesday. "He's a giant."

News of his death came as friend and executive producer Nick Gold was set to travel to Mali to deliver a Grammy Award that Toure and fellow musician Toumani Diabate won last month for "In the Heart of the Moon," said Dave McGuire, spokesman for World Circuit Records, Toure's London-based label.

The death of Mali's beloved son -- a farmer turned musician and cultural ambassador, who was later appointed mayor of his village -- was the cause for mourning: Radio and television stations played his music.

The Malian president was expected to participate in a tribute to Toure at the musician's house, McGuire said. Toure is survived by a wife and many children.

Guitarist Ry Cooder, who collaborated with Toure on a Grammy-Award winning CD "Talking Timbuktu," said Toure carried a sense of connection with the past, one that guided rather than limited his music.

He played an instrument known as a djerkel, a one-string guitar, and played traditional music on an electric guitar.

He was "highly conscious of the presence of the ancestors," Cooder said. "I asked him one time

Ali Ibrahim Toure was born in 1939, in the village of Kanau in northwest Mali, the 10th son of his mother but the first to survive infancy. For his strength and tenacity, for surviving, the family nicknamed him "Farka," which means donkey.