We regret that despite all efforts to resolve visa complications, Ablaye Cissoko will no longer be able to travel to London for this concert with Constantinople.

The show will proceed as a duo concert with Constantinople (Kiya Tabassian) and Patrick Graham on setar and percussion respectively.

Everywhere, from time immemorial, the Word has been embodied by the bard, the troubadour, the griot. These wordsmiths, at once messengers and peacemakers, are the links with the forces of nature, the inexpressible divine, the memory of the ancients. It falls to them to maintain the realm of the collective soul.

Nowadays, these freethinkers and travellers are making the world their garden… like Kiya Tabassian, the ambassador of Persian setar and Ablaye Cissoko, griot from Saint-Louis, Senegal, both eternally migrating birds.

This meeting between Ablaye Cissoko and Constantinople, between strings and vocals, goes back in time to evoke the beauty of being. It is a joint passage through the common sites of the imagination, like a long breath before the inexorable march of the world and time.

From the start, this dialogue between the kora and the setar seemed to come from the depths of the earth, as though these instruments, along with percussion (from Patrick Graham), had always existed side by side.

This natural symbiosis gave the musicians wings to fly towards distant horizons, and their music has been heard over two hundred times in various festivals and halls around the world.

‘The kora and setar sit perfectly together… [their] alternating voices are a breath of fresh air and contrast beautifully: Cissoko mellow and Tabassian spiritual. A program of regal and dignified magnificence’  ★★★★★ / ‘Top of the World’ – Songlines Magazine 

The performance will last approximately 90 minutes.