Gone to join the ancestors.

"Africa is my source of inspiration, my home base, my joy."

The great Malian musician Ali Farka Toure has died. His powerful music is an organic blend of the traditional music of Mali, American blues, and Islamic influences. Like John Lee Hooker, Ali Farka Toure has a haunting soulful voice whether singing or playing guitar that arises from a very profound place, somewhere close to humanity's source. He was also a great humanitarian, spending a lot of money to make his region of Mali a better place. His album, The Source, has been one of my longtime favourites. Talking Timbuktu, the collaboration he did with Ry Cooder is also a fine piece of work.

I'm been very aware in the past few years that the earth has lost some amazing spiritual and artistic giants like Ali Farka Toure, John Lee Hooker, Babatunde Olatunji, Mongo Santamaria, Elvin Jones. Sadly, I don't see people of their stature being replaced. Who will be the next generation of spiritual resources for the world?

Here's a short bio of Ali Farka Toure:

"Contrary to many African artists, Ali Farka Touré was never tempted to exile himself in the West, during the seventies and eighties when the expansion of World Music drew many of them to Europe. Quite the contrary. This musician, whose musical culture is impressive, respected and revered throughout the world, is truly closer than any other to his own land, Mali. To such a degree that today, after winning over the international music scene with his sensitive, inspired blues, he now spends most of his time farming. One reason for this is his passion for farming and his personal investment in great agricultural irrigation projects. The father of many children, Ali possesses 350 hectares of land, mostly rice fields, in his native Niafounké."

"Ali Farka Touré was now one of the biggest stars of African music, both on his own continent and in the West. The man who said of American blues music "I am the root and the trunk, all they have is the branches and the leaves", had the opportunity to play with John Lee Hooker in summer 91. Their highly symbolic duet represented the long road taken by African music over the centuries. But his greatest international success came when the album "Talking Timbuktu" came out in 93, based on the mythical theme of Timbuktu. This work, full of blues themes, was the result of collaboration with the American guitarist Ry Cooder. The critics were over the moon and the album, recorded in Los Angeles, won the Grammy Award, the supreme prize of the recording industry."

"In 1997, Ali declared that he wanted to retire from the stage to devote himself to farming in his village 200 km from Timbuktu. The man who says "it is written that I am an artist on my identity card, but in fact I am a farmer", announced his intention to provide work to young people in his region to stop them from abandoning rural areas."