Khasonka drumming, song, and dance from Mahina (Mali) (2012) Jelifòli suite

Toutou Sacko, Koly Sacko & Diallola community party play "Jelifòli" ("Griots' drumming)". This is a public live performance of Khasonka drumming, song, and dance in the former village of Diallola, which today is a suburb of Mahina. The piece jelifòli or jelidòn ("rhythm/dance of the griots") consists of several distinct sections associated with different tempo ranges, two of which, Sandia (slow) and Sandagundo (fast), are sequenced to form a suite in this performance. The change between the two sections occurs at 7:45 min.
The fact that the performed piece is jelifòli implies that it is mainly jeli (members of the hereditary socio-professional group of griots) who feel addressed and invited to dance. Among the prominent dancers are Djati Kuyate and Adama Diabate.
Toutou Sacko and Koly Sacko were hired to play the Khasonka-dundunba. They belong to the status-group of griots themselves, as do the semi-professional singers Luntandi Danba, Dua Kanoute and Terema Kanoute. The players of the huge third drum standing on three feet, called tantango, are amateurs, by contrast. They were all members of the Diallola village community and frequently took turns at playing: Sambouba Sissoko, Mamadou Bagayoko, Kambon Sidibe, Francois Sidibe, Moussa Fayinke, Sambali Makalu, Modi Keita. Videographer: RP, Mahina in March 2012.
The singing was amplified by a megaphone that was driven by an automobile battery, as is typical of local practice. I clipped-on mics to the two dundunba-drums in order to bring across the bass-heavy sound of these instruments, which is hard to capture with a conventional stereo field-recording from a distance. Despite the obvious intrusiveness of this cable-bound miking, the drummers felt quite at ease, as you might get from the video, and were able to perform "normally," as they said.
Read more about Khasonka drumming, and see and hear more examples, in the music theory article "Timing and Meter in Mande drumming from Mali" (Polak and London 2014). Among the examples studied in this article are studio and live recordings of the piece "Bire," which also belongs to the jelifòli-suite.