Liu Chen traveled to West Africa for work and encountered the kora instrument by chance. While working in the region, a friend invited a kora teacher to her house and she took lessons with him. This ignited a love for the stringed instrument of the Mandinka culture, and today she plays alongside her Malian husband Adama Yalomba Traore who accompanies her on the kamale ngoni, a stringed instrument found in Mali.
“When I went to Senegal, I found the kora and other traditional instruments. Later, in Mali, I was able to encounter more traditional instruments,” said Liu. “I started to search for and listen to kora music and I fell in love with this instrument. It’s very special because it has different sounds.”
In Mali, it sounds like classical music. It’s very calm and rich. When I Iisten to some Gambia or Senegal albums with the kora, I find it is more like folk music. So even though it’s the same instrument, every kora player has their own character and style. You can play the same song from traditional music but you can have your own way to interpret it,” she added.
The instruments the couple plays are made from the same materials. “The kora and the kamale ngoni are similar but they have different strings. They are both made from the calabash. The calabash is very important in [West African] culture: it’s not only used to make instruments, the calabash is also a container for food and water or drinks. For music, because it can be hollowed, it can give good sound. Wood is used for the neck of the instruments, and another important material is animal skin. So it’s very different from other instruments because it is made from different materials,” she explained.
The couple were in China this August for a series of performances, a trip they made from their home in Mali. Their trip this year included a workshop in Shanghai with budding kora and kamale ngoni players.
“Adama gave lessons on the ngoni, and I gave lessons on the kora. We found that they had the instruments. Even though there is a lack of a teacher, maybe they found lessons online, but they had started to play. Not all of them were from Shanghai, some had come from far off places like Ningxia and Guangzhou. They are motivated to learn; they have a passion for this music and these instruments.”
They hope to make this performance trip an annual event, in the hope of encouraging cultural exchange and interest in the West African instruments.
“We live in Mali and every year we plan to come to China to do a tour and music exchanges… This is our second tour here together. We work on music together and now we are working on our album. The future is very open. Maybe we will also work with some Chinese musicians to finish this album.”
As they continue to work and play music together, Liu hopes to start composing music for the kora and to possibly incorporate Chinese music.
“I have been playing the kora since 2020. Until now, I am still learning traditional music and I play traditional music. From next year, I want to compose some music. I will try to interpret some Chinese music, if the sounds work well.”
Coming from two different backgrounds, Liu says their collaboration is a form of cultural exchange that can be inspiring.
“Adama is from Mali and I am from China, so we have two roots that cannot be changed. We are trying to bring more exchange from each side. Tours and concerts are a kind of exchange because people come to listen to what you are presenting. With the workshops that we teach, people come with an interest to play the instruments. It’s important to have exchanges between different cultures, so we can learn more about each other and have less misunderstandings. The more we know each other deeply, the more we can understand each other’s cultures.”