Massa Dembele - Falatô (2026) [Official Digital Download]

Massa Dembele is a songwriter, griot, percussionist and master of the camel N'Goni, a West African harp.

Nine years ago, he left Burkina Faso to find an international audience for his music. His journey took him to Ghana, among other places, where he recorded his debut album for the Canadian label Izniz. Today he lives in Hamburg and Konstanz. Massa grew up in the provincial capital of Nouna in western Burkina Faso. He comes from a griot family. ‘The griots have many social and cultural roles; they spread news, tell stories, settle disputes – and they also provide entertainment,’ says Massa. He has been making music from an early age. ‘As a child, I used to organise percussion sessions with my siblings and cousins in the afternoons – we played on tomato cans because we had nothing else.’ His uncle taught him to play the djembe and balafon, and as a teenager he played traditional music at christenings and weddings. Later, he took up the kamele n'goni, the West African ‘harp of youth’ invented in Mali and Burkina Faso in the 1960s. He sings in Bambara or Dioula, as the language is called in Burkina Faso.


His new album ‘Falatô’ will be released on 17 April on Not OK Records – it is his third – and his first with a large band line-up. Drums, bass, guitar, shimmering synthesizer solos, crisp brass and, above all, the voice and kamele n'goni of Massa Dembele: ‘Falatô’, recorded in Bobo-Dioulasso, Burkina Faso, with local musicians, is Afrobeat and jazz, West African soul, desert blues and griot music.

The album sounds like Fela Kuti, like Ali Farka Touré, and at the same time it sounds unmistakably like Massa Dembele – the throaty, powerful voice, the hypnotic harp cascades of his N'Goni.


Drums, calabash: Achille Nacoulma
Conga: Joannie Labelle
Guitar: Ousmane Koita Fodé
Bass: Bouba Ouattara
Trumpet: Innocent Esiaku Kwamivi
Saxophone: Stéphane Kientega N`manegda
Flute: Faisal Diarra Moussa
Piano/Keyboard: Parido Sanou Mohamed
Piano: Jean-Philippe Rykiel
Balafon: Moussa Diarra, Seydou Diabaté
Kora-Ngoni & Percussion: Massa Adama Dembele
Tama-Arako: Adama de pamayeri Dembele
Chekere-Maracasse: Kassoum Dembele
Choir: Awa Guindo, Fatoumata Dembele, Kassoum Dembele, Fofana

Tracklist:
01 Mai zanna Dimignan
02 Tugan
03 Falato
04 Siya
05 Hommage
06 Daan kan
07 Jigiya
08 Janfa


Thanks to the Original customer!