I Mada - Habib Koité & Bamana

From the album Ma Ya, released Jan 1, 1998

I was looking for another of Habib Koité’s songs to sing; he has so many beautiful songs. But for now, this one, in 6/8 time, just grabbed my heart.

It starts out with an instrumental intro, which sounds vaguely oriental, like Chinese music to my ear anyway, but that’s because it’s in a pentatonic scale and as I understand it, pentatonic scales are used a lot in both Japanese and Chinese music. The pentatonic finger-plucking of what is probably a kamale n’goni continues throughout the song, but what makes the instrumentation so special is the overlay of heptatonic chords (if I’m not mistaken) with electric guitar on top of it. It seems to me this is a characteristic feature of Habib Koité’s music, namely, blending the traditional and the modern together.

Note how the hand-clapping sets the rhythm in this song. This is reminiscent of palmas in flamenco. In this style, some claps are more emphatic than others to indicate the first beat in the bar or to emphasize beats that have a longer duration. Say this out loud and you’ll understand what I mean:

Ta tara Ta tara | ta-Ta… ta-Ta…
1—1-1—1—1-1 | 1—2—--1—2

This is a 6/8 pattern with emphasis on Ta, which is hand-clapped in this song. In the first 6 beat bar, the emphasis is on the first and third claps, which are 1/8th notes or quavers. In the second 6 beat bar, the emphasis is on the second and fourth claps, but these are 1/4th notes or quarternotes, which last twice as long as a 1/8th note or quaver. The numbers under the words indicate the duration of the clap in quavers.

Here’s what clapping this pattern actually sounds like:

The song explicitly uses some French lines like “Je t’aime,” but it appears Bambara has some French loan words like “école” and “chérie.” For the most part, that is to be expected from contact between diverse cultures over time. English absorbed a lot of words from various Indian languages (jungle, bungalow, chutney, thug, bandana, loot, shampoo, teapoy, mahout, juggernaut, guru from Hindi, catamaran from Malayalam, etc.) during the days of the British Raj. An exhaustive list of loan words would be out of the scope of this post, and would include borrowings from many more Indian languages, including, of course, mother Sanskrit.

The reverse is also true. Most Indian languages lacked words for modern inventions like the steam engine, telephone, television and computer, and so these were adopted into them. There was some attempt to come up with words in Sanskrit. For instance, लौपतगामिनी (pronounced lau-paθ-ga-mi-nee, literally, iron vehicle) was introduced to replace the steam engine, but never made it into popular usage.

In contrast, I do not believe French ever absorbed loan words from other languages, especially those that were spoken in its colonies. This was almost certainly due to the efforts of the Académie Française, established in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu to maintain the purity of the French language and regulate its usage. Spanish too also had its own language bureaucracy at the Real Academia Española. By contrast, English was most promiscuous and borrowed extensively from all of the languages it encountered, even French and Spanish despite having left no colonial imprint on either France or Spain.

It is rather hard to find the lyrics for Habib Koité’s songs, and even harder to find correct translations. So, I prefer to make a copy here just to be safe, instead of providing a link. All credit goes to posters at the original links, which are also supplied.

This is a song about unrequited love, which is a rite of passage for all humans.

Here’s my rendition. As usual, I did the second and third voice as well.

Here’s the original studio version:

Lyrics (in Bambara, copied from here for your convenience, all credits to the original.)

I mada mada
Ali nimi mada n'gné
Moi je t'aime
I mada mada
Ali nimi mada n'gné
Moi je t'aime
Kounou sogoma né milé yé école ta sira la
Aw djigui touma séra né milé yé so ta sira la
Kana souroun
Nima yèlè né fai, nébédé fai
I kana dimi, ali nima kouma né fai, nébédé fai
Ali nima yèlè né fai, nébédé fai
I bolo do bolo an ka ta ba bolo fai
Djiri na koumiyé, ali sangolo na koumiyé, lolo na mana mana san na
Hummm nébédé fai
Kelenaa chériie(nébédé fai)
I gnai djo n'gnai la anka miri gnon faiii
I hakili na koumiyé, bai hakili na koumiyé
Ko nénédé dara gnon gné hummm
Nébédé fai n'kéléna chériiiie(nébédé fai)
Ka sékai né yé bii, an béta hairai sooo
Ka sékai né yé bi, an béto naima so
I kana sourouuun, nima yèlè né fai(nébédé fai)
I kana sourouuun, ali nima yèlè né fai(nébédé fèèèè)
Ali nima kouma né fai(nébédé fèèèè)
Ali nima yèlè né fai(nébédé fèèèè)
Ali nima kouma né fai(nébédé fèèèè)

---

Translation
NB: Copied from here for your convenience, all credits to the original.

Calm down, Calm down my dear love
Even if you don't feel anything for me now, I will be patient.
Yesterday morning I didn't get to see you on our way to school. (They use to walk to go to school together)
And on our way back home I didn't get to see you either my love.
Please don't be mad at me even though you don't talk to me, even though you don't smile with me, you are the one that I love.
Please, give me your hand and let's walk along the riverside.
The river can talk to you about my love and even the shining stars in the sky can witness my love for you and tell you that I'm deep in love with you.
Please give me just a smile.
Please look at me in the eyes and let's think together.
If I had all the money of the world and pick between you.
I would choose you and be poor because you and I were born to be together.
So please don't be mad like that
You are the love of my life my dear.