Ethics and Aesthetics



Dialy Mady Cissoko. Photograph by the author

Chapter 3: Ethics and Aesthetics observes the sounds and sentiments of personhood among Malian artists (artistiya) through close and sustained analysis of musical performance and perception. By listening in to a solo concert performance of a renowned kora virtuoso and an informal rehearsal of an up-and-coming Bamako band, this chapter describes how a culturally modeled musical aesthetics audibly signifies a dialectic social structure of collectively oriented morality and individually motivated ethics among artists and their audiences in Mali today.

KEY TERMS

• bolomanboli: an aesthetic term in Mande music (Bamana, “running by hand”) used to refer to virtuosic soloing and improvisation
  
• fadenya: a term in Mande social thought (Bamana, “father-child-ness”) that refers, negatively, to competition and conflict and, positively, to creativity and innovation in society
  
• fasiya: a term in Mande social thought (Bamana, “father’s lineage”) that refers to a sense of cultural patrimony and tradition
  
• fɔlikan: an aesthetic term in Mande music (Bamana, the “voice of musical performance”) comparable to the concept of melody 
  
• fɔlisenw: an aesthetic term in Mande music (Bamana, “musical feet”) used to describe rhythm, with an implied emphasis on dance
  
• kunbɛn: an aesthetic term in Mande music (Bamana, “meeting at the head”) referring to the core melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic patterns that constitute the accompaniment of a piece 
  
• perceived space: a Lefebvrian concept referring to the world of the senses in which people feel, touch, taste, smell, and hear the social spaces they inhabit and, through sensuous practice (of, for example, making and listening to music), actively and feelingfully (re)produce those spaces
  

WHO'S WHO

• Toumani Diabaté: world-renowned kora (21-stringed Mande harp) virtuoso, professional artist, and traditional griot (jeli); son of Sidiki Diabaté (the elder) and father to Sidiki Diabaté (the younger)
  
• Sidiki Diabaté (the elder): traditional Mande griot (jeli), known during his lifetime as “the king of the kora,” and professional artist who helped found the Ensemble Instrumental National du Mali; father to Toumani Diabaté
  
• Nana Soumbounou: Malian artist and lead singer of the (now disbanded) Bamako dance band the Triton Stars
  

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

1. Mande aesthetic discourse employs metaphors of the body and senses to describe the character and feeling of musical sound. Can you think of other communities that employ embodied and sensuous discourse about music? Are they comparable to or different from the Mande case? 
   
2. What do the musical lives and works of Sidiki Diabaté and his son Toumani reveal about the morality of tradition and the ethics of innovation in the contemporary Mande world?
   
3. How are musical aesthetics and practices gendered in Mande music? Looking comparatively at the chapter’s two case studies, think about the role masculine and feminine identities play in the expressions and professional aspirations of artists in places like Bamako. 

FURTHER READINGS & DISCUSSION

• Toumani and Sidiki official home page: http://www.toumaniandsidiki.com/ 
  
• “Toumani and Sidiki: ‘It’s like an entire music industry in one family’” by Andy Morgan:  http://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/may/22/toumani-diabate-sidiki-kora-music-industry-family 
• “Films of Growing Into Music in Mali and Guinea” by Lucy Durán:           http://growingintomusic.co.uk/mali-and-guinea-music-of/films-of-growing-into-music.html 
• Sidikiba’s Kora Lesson by Ryan T. Skinner:  http://www.sidikibaskoralesson.com/