Kade diawara biography of abraham

The azmari is the Ethiopian equivalent of the West African griot - a troubadour, a truth-teller and "court jester" all in one, disdained and beloved at the same time.

The essential release Éthiopiques 2: Techawet!: Urban Azmaris of the '90s (Buda Musique 82952-2, 1997) traces the development of a new urban form of the azmari's art to the the fall of the putatively "Marxist-Leninist" Dergue regime in 1991.

Restricted by a curfew for the previous 18 years, residents of Addis Ababa took to nightlife with a vengeance, giving rise to many new azmarebets, or cabarets devoted to this musical form.

The usual azmari ensemble is composed of one or two vocalists, players of the krar (Ethiopian lyre), masinqo (one-stringed violin), percussion and perhaps accordeon.

As today's selection, the cassette Democracy Mebtesh (Negarit Music Shop, ca. 1992) illustrates, this combination can be supplemented by organ or synthesiser, electric bass and drum machine (somewha