Traore grew up a diplomat's daughter, traveling the globe. Fluent in Bambara and French, she sings one song in English on "Tchamantche" -- a cover of George Gershwin's "The Man I Love" that recalls the best work of jazz queen Cassandra Wilson.
"I started listening to American traditional blues, jazz and R&B when I was 5," said Traore. "I was listening to this the same time as I discovered African music. To say that the blues began in Africa, everybody knew about that. And African music comes back to American blues for people like me."
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Friday, March 27, 2009 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 4 National Desk 1 inches; 35 words Type of Material: Correction
African music: An article about African music in Sunday's Arts & Books section identified James Diener as chief executive and president of Octone Records. His correct title is chief executive and president of A&M/Octone Records.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Sunday, March 29, 2009 Home Edition Sunday Calendar Part D Page 2 Calendar Desk 1 inches; 29 words Type of Material: Correction
African music: An article last Sunday about African music identified James Diener as CEO and president of Octone Records. His correct title is CEO and president of A&M/Octone Records.
Amadou & Mariam, the blind married couple from Mali whose career-changing 2005 album, "Dimanche a Bamako," helped define the current African shift, have a similar relationship to their homeland and the world. Their new album, "Welcome to Mali," was partly produced by Brit-pop elder Damon Albarn and takes their "Afro-blues" sound into unexpected corners.
"The way we are doing this music is a positive side of globalization," said Amadou Bagayoko in a phone call from London, promoting the American release of "Welcome to Mali," coming March 24 on Nonesuch. "For us to be able to collaborate with people from different cultures is good. We're still doing our own music, but we are open to others."
For Somali-born, Toronto-based hip-hop artist K'Naan, "African music" can't be contained by any one definition -- and not even by the boundaries of the continent itself. "Troubadour," his just-released second album and debut on the A&M/Octone label, incorporates samples of vintage Ethiopian funk along with reggae, rap and even hard rock influences. Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett solos on one cut.
"In my music, I do address Africa in general," said K'Naan, 30, in Hollywood last month for a date at the Roxy. "I address Somalia more specifically because I know it more intimately. I was made in that stream. I owe a debt and gratitude to that world. But I think there is no real start and stop between being African and being an immigrant. My spirit is obsessed with movement, and the distance that is caused by the movement. So I never allow myself to feel at home anywhere."
Nowhere outside its own boundaries is the African idea of "home" more fraught than it is in America. The fundamental links among African music, jazz and the blues were forged through the slave trade and have been well documented. Another parallel emerged during the 1960s, when South African exiles Miriam Makeba and Hugh Masekela came to represent the civil rights struggle on a global scale.
