Bassekou Kouyate was born into the Malian caste of musicians and storytellers known as the griots in 1966. He is the master of West Africa's oldest string instrument, the ngoni. Before founding his own band, he played with stars such as Taj Mahal, Ry Cooder, Toumani Diabate, Keletigui Diabate and Ali Farka Toure, but his real global success came with his four-piece ngoni band Ngoni Ba. Bands from Mali previously featured only a single ngoni, so no one could imagine what Bassekou had in min...d by combining four ngonis… But by the time his debut Segu Blue album had won the BBC's "African Artist of the Year” and "Album of the Year”, the small plucked instrument was well and truly in fashion.
Bassekou went on to achieve a string of successes. His I Speak Fula album was nominated for a Grammy Award, while Jama Ko, released in 2013, was the number one album of the year on the World Music Charts Europe and in numerous industry magazines. Bassekou and his band also joined the Africa Express project, performing in England with Paul McCartney, John Paul Jones and Damon Albarn. He has performed in Hungary twice to date: at the Vidor Festival in 2010 and at Sziget in 2014. He arrives at Müpa Budapest on tour with his latest album, a narcotic cocktail of Mali blues and psychedelic rock.
Presented by: Palace of Arts
Parking information
We wish to inform you that in the event that Müpa Budapest's underground garage and outdoor car park are operating at full capacity, it is advisable to plan for increased waiting times when you arrive. In order to avoid this, we recommend that you depart for our events in time, so that you you can find the ideal parking spot quickly and smoothly and arrive for our performance in comfort. The Müpa Budapest underground garage gates will be operated by an automatic number plate recognition system. Parking is free of charge for visitors with tickets to any of our paid performances on that given day. The detailed parking policy of Müpa Budapest is available here.
Safe ticket purchase
Dear Visitors, please note that only tickets purchased from the Müpa website and official ticket offices are guaranteed to be valid. To avoid possible inconvenience, we suggest buying tickets to our performances and concerts via the mupa.hu website, the Interticket national network (jegy.hu) or at our official ticket offices.