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GRIOT PAPA SUSSO TO VISIT OBERLIN NEXT WEEK AS PART OF BLACK HISTORY MONTH CELEBRATION
FEBRUARY 21, 2002-- Alhaji Papa Susso, kora* virtuoso, traditional musician and an oral historian who descends from a long line of griots in Gambia, West Africa, will come to Oberlin next week to take part in Oberlin's black history month celebration.
On Monday and Tuesday, he will speak to students at Langston Middle School and Oberlin High School and visit classes at the College. On Tuesday, he will attend a dinner at the College's Afrikan Heritage House at 6 P.M. and give a performance/talk at 7 P.M. in Lord Lounge.
The famed griot began learning the kora from his father at the age of five. He received the B.A. degree in 1969 from Outington University in Suakoko, Liberia, and pursued a career in The Gambia civil service for several years before returning to his traditional role as a kora player to help preserve his African culture, becoming the chief kora player of the Gambia National Cultural Troupe.
In 1974, he resigned from the group to form The Manding Music and Dance Limited, a company dedicated to conducting research and carrying out studies into the history, traditions and ethnomusicology of Manding. Papa Susso says its aim is also "to carry on the business and to assist the performing artists in the presentation of music and folklore of Manding and to revive, expose and promote a better understanding and appreciation of the music culture of the Manding."
Papa Susso, who was appointed Regents' Lecturer in ethnomusicology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, in 1991, is a premier performer in African Portraits, a multicultural, multilingual 50-minute oratorio for chorus and orchestra that received rave reviews when it premiered by the American Composers Orchestra in New York in 1990. The work, which has been recorded by Teldec, is by Hannibal Peterson and incorporates African folk music, gospel and jazz in a series of dramatic scenes that trace the history of blacks in the U.S.
Papa Susso also has performed twice at Carnegie Hall twice and with the Baltimore, Detroit, Kalamazoo, San Antonio, St. Louis and Chicago symphonies and the Louisiana Philharmonic and the Kazumi Watanabe Opera in Tokyo.
*The kora -- invented by the "Susso" family of the Mandinka tribe of the great Manding Empire -- is a 21-stringed harp-lute unique to the western-most part of Africa and is meant to be played only by the Jali (professional musicians, praise singers and oral historians), who were traditionally attached to the royal courts. Their duties included recounting tribal history and genealogy, composing commemorative songs and performing at important tribal events.
To see his art, please visit his website.
Media Contact: Sue Kropp
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