Seckou Keita: “My mum and aunties were griot singers… there was no escaping it!”

Seckou Keita is moving on, with an adventurous new solo project that marks a return to his African roots. “I like to explore,” explains the kora star. “There are a lot of things in my head I want to share with the world.” He may be celebrated for his collaborations – most famously with the remarkable Welsh harp player Catrin Finch – but now he is the leader of the Homeland band. Their debut album, Homeland (Chapter 1), explores a remarkably varied range of styles, with his constantly varied and exquisite kora playing at its epicentre. It’s bravely original, both because of the musical variety, and because of its unusual concept.

Born in Senegal but based in the UK for the past 25 years, Seckou sets out to explore the idea of where home is. He says that he began thinking about this “during COVID, when we were all stuck at home and couldn’t go out… is my home in Nottingham, or Senegal? Is home a space, or a landscape? Is it where you grew up, or work, or live now? I’m not a writer, and music is my only way to answer something like this.”

The starting point was the single ‘Homeland’ that he recorded in 2017 with the Senegalese star Baaba Maal, who is “amazing and down to earth… we got on very well.” Baaba apparently enjoyed the session at his Dakar home so much that he insisted that they kept going until well after three in the morning. Next came another standalone single recorded with the Senegalese singer Aida Samb, and then Seckou began work on a full album of new songs, on which he is accompanied by an impressive and varied array of Senegalese musicians.

The key figure in all of this was his friend, the producer and keyboard player Moussa Ngom, who has worked with Youssou N’Dour – and whose dad Papa Omar Ngom played guitar in Youssou’s band “for decades.” They prepared the new songs at Seckou’s home studio in Ziguinchor, where he grew up, and then moved on to Youssou’s studio in Dakar to continue recording. Musicians taking part found that Seckou had an unusual way of approaching the sessions. “Whether it was a drummer, a guitarist or a backing vocalist, they had no clue what they were coming to. They’d walk into the studio, listen to the track and play into it. I think it’s important to see the first reaction of a human being when they hear something. Sometimes they’d ask for a second go, but I tried to catch that first take!”

The influences on the album range from ancient griot styles to mbalax, ballads, Afro-pop and hip-hop, and the cast includes anyone from Abdoulaye Sidibé, “a guy who knows about the griot culture,” through to the Daara J Family, “one of the star urban hip-hop groups in Senegal.” They can be heard on ‘Home Sweet Home’, a track Seckou describes as “a reflection on what home means to them.” Then there’s guitar from Moustapha Gaye, from Youssou’s band, while backing singers include the “amazing” Korka Dieng. The album was recorded and mixed across four countries (Senegal, the UK, Belgium and Germany) and includes songs in Mandinka, Wolof, English and French.

Included on the album are two spoken pieces, with lyrics in English not written by Seckou, but by young London-based British poets. ‘Reflections’ is a thoughtful piece about ‘a homeland just out of reach,’ written by Zena Edwards, while the pained and powerful ‘Deportation Blues’ is by Hannah Lowe. Seckou says he played the piece, using Hannah’s sampled voice matched against his kora, when he gave a concert at Warren Hill prison, near Snape Maltings. “And it was a deep, deep moment for those guys. We had a really good chat and sang together at the end. I like making music for everyone.”

Growing up in Ziguinchor, in the Casamance region, Seckou was surrounded by music. He never knew his father, as his parents separated when he was very young, so he was brought up by his mother, a griot. “My mum and aunties were griot singers,” he says, “and my mum played percussion too – but my cousins and uncles are kora players. So, there was no escaping it!” As a child who “became known as ‘Seckou Little Griot’ in Mandinka,” he learned kora and also percussion, from talking drums to djembé and drum kit, which he played with local hotel bands. After moving to the UK in 1999 he was involved in a project teaching African percussion, and then played djembé and drums with Baka Beyond. “And through that, a lot of things happened…”

His many, many projects since then include his appearance at the 2003 Handpicked concert at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, a ‘celebration of the plucked string,’ where he played kora in a line-up that also included guitarist Martin Simpson and harpist Llio Rhydderch (“the first time I discovered the Welsh harp!”). Then came a batch of solo projects, including albums with his Quartet, three magnificent albums with Catrin Finch, collaborations with the Cuban jazz pianist Omar Sosa, and the AKA Trio, in which he played with the Italian guitarist Antonio Forcione and Brazilian percussionist Adriano Adewale. Then there was his work with Paul Weller, who he met through Africa Express, and his involvement in the Spell Songs project, along with British folk stars including Julie Fowlis and Karine Polwart.

Why is he interested in exploring such a wide musical range? “I just want to keep moving. If I’m doing just one project I feel as if someone is holding my neck tight and I can’t move!”

His work with Omar Sosa will continue – they are touring together in the US in January – but he says there will be no more collaborations with Catrin Finch. The focus for now is on Homeland, and he’s already thinking about the next album, Chapter 2. “There will be another element – but I want to keep that as a secret.”

+ Seckou Keita is touring the UK until November 12, followed by dates in Europe

This article originally appeared in the December 2024 issue of Songlines. Never miss an issue – subscribe today