Malian kora player Toumani Diabaté comes from a long family tradition (seventy-one generations in a patrilineal line) of griot musicians and first appeared on Ba Togoma, an album by his father's ensemble. He followed that with Kaira, recorded in an afternoon in London and has gone on to work in a variety of cross-cultural settings (a combined group known as Songhai with flamenco group Ketama and the versatile bassist Danny Thompson, Taj Maha, jazz trombonist Roswell Rudd, Björk, and Brazilian players Arnaldo Antunes and Edgard Scandurra).
Those ventures, of course, are in addition to explorations of African themes with Ballake Sissoko, Ali Farka Touré and his own Symmetric Orchestra..
Discography:
1987 Ba Togoma (with Sidiki Diabaté, Mariama Kouyaté, Djeli Mady Sissoko, Kandia Kouayté)
1988 Kaira
1988 Songhai (with Ketama and Danny Thompson)
1994 Songhai 2 (with Ketama and Danny Thompson)
1995 Djelika
1999 New Ancient Strings (with Ballake Sissoko)
1999 Kulanjan (with Taj Mahal)
2001 Jarabi: the Best of Toumani Diabate
2002 Malicool (with Roswell Rudd)
2005 In the Heart of the Moon (with Ali Farka Touré)
2006 Boulevard de l'Indépendance (Toumani Diabaté’s Symmetric Orchestra)
2008 The Mandé Variations
2010 Ali and Toumani (with Ali Farka Touré)
2011 A Curva da Cintura (with Arnaldo Antunes and Edgard Scandurra)