BADEMA

Badema are a gifted, individual and energetic band playing a mix of African, Latin and Jazz music known as Mandingo Jazz. They are fronted by the excellent Moussa Diakite, the Mali born singer/guitarist who first came to Australia on tour with Salif Keita (Salif Keita is a big international West African singer. He played at the last Womad festival in Adelaide and is among the first of the West African singers ( Youssouf Ndour, Baaba Maal etc) to gain international critical acclaim).

The band at it's bare minimum consists of Moussa, John Mackey on alto sax, Richie Maegraith on tenor sax, Len Samperi on bass and Martin Highland on drums but expands to include percussion and female backing vocals. They are managed by Moussa's wife Jessy and can be seen on Sat 16 Aug at the Northern Star Hotel, 112 Beaumont St., Hamilton (Ph. 049 611087), Sat 6 Sept. At the Marlborough Hotel, 145 King, Newtown (Ph. 9519 1222), Sat 13 Sept. in the Carnivale at the Rocks, Sydney and Sun 21 Sept - 12 midday - in an outdoor lunchtime gig at Martin Place.

TU: Moussa, how long have you been playing and when did you come to Australia?

Moussa - I started playing guitar in 1966, 31 years ago. I came here first of all with Salif Keita on a tour in 1992 and then came back eighteen months later.

TU: It's an unusual setup - a bunch of Aussies playing African music - how does it work?

Moussa - Australians play this music because music has no barriers.

John - I come from a classical and jazz background but I'm not a purist - I'll play anything, I'm just worried about quality. What we play is musically challenging but accessible to the public. Even though it is heavily jazz based the melodies are very strong and to the fore. No one knows you are playing 'out there' jazz because they hear the groove.

Len - In some ways it's simple. The chords are simple but rhythmically it is very difficult, very different to anything I've ever played before. If you're a musician you understand a common language. It's partly us understanding it and partly Moussa teaching us - showing us his style of music.

Moussa - We communicate together.

TU: How did you all meet up?

Len - When I met Moussa he was busking in Paddington, I had no idea who he was - I just saw him playing guitar and thought - "This guy is amazing." There was something about the music that was incredibly joyful. I listened to him for a while and told him that I'd love to jam with him so we exchanged phone numbers.
About six months later I got a call from him saying that his bass player was away and he needed a replacement. I started playing with him and it was then that I realized what a serious musician, a real heavyweight, he was - and I had thought that he was just some guy jamming in Paddington!

Jessy - Yeah, but you brought your bongos over first. I remember after you came over with your bongos Moussa said - "Oh, no no - he no good bongo player!"

(Len looks a bit shocked. I decide to change the subject quickly!)
TU: What was your musical background before that?

Len - A whole lot of different things - rock bands, soul bands, contemporary acoustic folk but after seeing Paul Simon at the Entertainment Centre I fell in love with African music.
To Moussa - So you didn't like my bongo playing?!

TU: How do you see the music scene in Australia today?

John - Potentially incredible - there is so much talent out there. Unfortunately there are not enough venues and most of them are opting to play CDs through P.A. systems rather than pay for live musicians, which is understandable economically. I think there are possibilities but it's up to musicians to go for it, to be proactive rather than reactive. Nobody is going to do it for you, you have to bite the bullet and go out and do it for yourself.
(John, along with Jessy, is responsible for the band bookings)

Moussa - I would say that we need help, not just African musicians but all musicians. We need the industry to open the door and give us a chance. They get overseas musicians to come and play here - only because they have a name. They come, take all this money and go again! We have a lot of very good musicians here, we need to put the money behind those who live here and give them some power.

Martin - There was a recent worldwide boom in Australian music but that seems to have died down. When it was over, the 'powers that be' made noises about supporting it but it almost seems like 'too little - too late'. That was an opportunity that could have been used to create something equivalent to the Australian film industry which now wins awards at Cannes.

Martin feels that in order to become financially viable a lot of Australian musicians have to compromise themselves -

Martin - I've seen some real heavyweight jazz musicians play with ridiculous bands - with funk rhythm sections and didgeridoo and tabla players, all because some manager has decided that that is what's 'happening' at the time. We had one promoter who told us that he was getting an African show together and wanted us to do an African Blues Brothers act!
When somebody plays quality music a lot of people in the industry are not remotely interested.

TU: You've been looking for a record deal, what reactions have you had?

Jessy - Mixed - we're told one thing first, then another. One company we approached said they'd sign us but there's been no commitment.

(At the expense of $2500 Badema have produced a CD to send to record companies. One record company they phoned up and asked to return their CD refused because they hadn't included a postage stamp with the CD!)

Richie - What I also find bewildering is that we do gigs and everyone in the place gets totally into it yet we still have trouble getting gigs. I can't work it out. I mean it would be different if we did some gigs and people didn't like us but that's not the case.

(When I went to see them at the Woollahra Hotel they had the whole place up dancing)

John - We include the crowd rather than putting out a barrier and being 'precious'. I see this as a healing type of music, I don't mean that in a religious or spiritual way but just that we bring people together. When we play everyone has a smile on their face.
Our music transcends age barriers. At the Apollo Bay Music Festival we had eight hundred people from the age of five to the age of sixty dancing and screaming for more. People were coming up and asking "How come I've never heard of you?"

Moussa - The only opening for African music in Australia is for people who come over here, put on big clothes, stick their chests out and dance like cannibals! Most of the attention given to African music is given to percussion but there is a lot more to African music than that. When the white explorers first went to Africa they picked up on the percussion but even then we had flutes and many other harmonious instruments. Nowadays we have a very strong emphasis on harmony with a lot of chromatic scales and syncopated rhythm, not just bam, bam, bam on the drums!

One promoter told me that my band has not got fire.
"What do you mean?" - I asked him.
"They're not black. You need to have a black band."
"Ah,"- I said - "if that's what you want then next time we play I'll cover them in shoe polish!"

David Cotter