Recorded in Bamako in 1970, "Cordes Anciennes" was the first album devoted entirely to the kora. Master griots Sidiki Diabaté and Djelimady Sissoko committed the oral repertoire of the Mande empire to tape with microtonal bends — the seed of the blue note — and a speech-like, narrative touch. That pitch flexibility is the very source the blues would inherit as the "blue note."
In 1999, the sons Toumani Diabaté and Ballaké Sissoko answered their fathers' landmark with "New Ancient Strings," recorded in a single live take in a marble hallway of Bamako's conference center. The old bones remain, but the playing carries the new techniques and styles of modern Bamako — a griot lineage handed down and redefined across generations.
The same griot lineage, redefined across generations: the fathers' "Ancient Strings" (1970) become the sons' "New Ancient Strings" (1999).