Multi-instrumentalist Keletigui Traoré was already an established bandleader when Independence arrived in Guinea in 1958. During new president Sekou Touré’s campaign for ‘Authenticité’, he joined the newly formed Syli Orchestre National, in which the cream of the nation’s musicians were to gradually develop and nurture Guinean music, a style that would become one of Africa’s greatest. Once the National orchestre had set the precedent there emerged a network of Guinean state-sponsored groups, of which Orchestre de la Paillote, under Keletigui’s direction, was at the forefront.

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