After a successful visit to Baton Rouge last year, virtuoso Gambian musician Sona Jobarteh is returning to the Manship Theatre on April 27.
Jobarteh is a master of the kora, a harp-lute instrument that is traditionally played by West African Griot families. Historically only played by men, she is the first professional female kora virtuoso to come from any of the West African Griot dynasties.
Also an accomplished singer and composer, Jobarteh majored in western classical composition at the Purcell School of Music in the UK as a teenager. She can play a range of instruments, having studied the cello, piano and harpsichord at the Royal College of Music in London.
Her compositions have appeared on the big screen — she scored the films ‘Motherland’ and ‘Beast’ — and she has performed at venues including the Hollywood Bowl and Paris’s Seine Musicale.
Jobarteh is also a social activist. In 2015 she set up an academy in The Gambia focusing on educational reform, and she has spoken at United Nations summits and at the World Trade Organization.
Her Baton Rouge stop is part of a wider 2023 spring tour, which comes in the wake of her first full album release in more than a decade. ‘Badinyaa Kumoo’, released last year, was named as one of the 10 best albums of 2022 by Songlines magazine.Â
Who: Sona Jobarteh
Where: Manship Theatre
When: 7.30 p.m., Thursday, April 27.
Cost: $35-$50
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