CASAMANCE: THE SOUNDTRACK OF A JOURNEY

Jairo Zavala, a Spanish singer and songwriter with African and Latin-American roots and member of the indie-rock band Calexico, is invited by Ángel Carmona to participate in a series of radio interviews. As an omniscient narrator, Carmona’s radio voice strings together Zavala’s adventures through Senegal on the trail of a particular griot: Lamine Konté. On this journey from Dakar to Casamance he witnesses the return on stage of an “afromandinga” music band doomed into oblivion 30 years ago, the Dieuf-Dieul de Thiès. There, he gets to know about the African music genres that went to America only to return home, such as the soul, rock, rumba, etc., and the griot mysticism of Casamance, Land of Kings, where Zavala seeks the inspirations to compose the soundtrack of the journey itself.