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African stars Amadou & Mariam nominated for 2005 MOBO Award |
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Monday, 26 September 2005 |
 African stars Amadou & Mariam – whose acclaimed ‘Dimanche à Bamako’ album was released in the UK at the start of June - have been nominated for a 2005 MOBO Award as Best World Music Act.
This is the second European awards ceremony to honour the Malian duo – earlier this year Amadou & Mariam won a prestigious Les Victoires de la Musique, the French equivalent of the Grammys. Indeed, ‘Dimanche à Bamako’ is currently number two in the French chart, the highest position an African act has ever achieved in any European album chart.
Also nominated alongside Amadou & Mariam for the 2005 MOBO Awards are Ali Farka Toure & Toumani Diabate, Daddy Yankee, Miguel Anga Diaz and Zap Mama, the winner to be decided by public vote via www.mobo.com. The MOBO Awards – this year celebrating its 10th anniversary - will be staged at London’s Royal Albert Hall on Thursday 22nd September and televised by BBC1 the following evening, Friday 23rd September.
The MOBO Awards come immediately prior to Amadou & Mariam’s debut UK and Irish tour, opening at DUBLIN Whelans on Monday 26th September and continuing at MANCHESTER Academy (Tuesday 27th September); BIRMINGHAM Glee Club (Wednesday 28th September); LONDON Shepherds Bush Empire (Thursday 29th September); GLASGOW King Tuts Wah Wah Hut (Saturday 1st October) and BRISTOL Fiddlers Club (Sunday 2nd October).
London fans will also have a unique opportunity to meet Amadou & Mariam when they host a special screening of a behind-the-scenes documentary about the making of ‘Dimanche à Bamako’. The hour-long film will be shown at the Ritzy cinema in Brixton, starting at 5.00 pm on Saturday 24th September. The screening will be followed by a question and answer session with Amadou & Mariam.
‘Dimanche à Bamako’, now a platinum album in France, has been an extraordinary success around Europe. The album - produced by and featuring the celebrated French / Latin artist, Manu Chao –adds an extra dimension to the reputation the duo have long since acquired in their native Mali and throughout West Africa. Amadou Bagayoko, for instance, cut his musical teeth playing guitar in the Ambassadeurs du Motel de Bamako, one of the hottest bands in West Africa during the Seventies.
His musical partnership with wife Mariam Doumbia ignited with a series of cassette albums recorded in the Côte d'Ivoire during the late-Eighties and early-Nineties. Those albums brought them fame right across the African continent.
Amadou & Mariam also found a European home in Paris. From 1998 they toured heavily throughout France, at the same time releasing three major label albums that enhanced their reputations throughout the world. The duo came to the attention of Manu Chao, the legendary artist whose 1998 ‘Clandestino’ album had proved to be a landmark of Latin music. Chao agreed to produce Amadou & Mariam’s next album, resulting in ‘Dimanche à Bamako’, which was released in France at the end of last year.
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