''The River'' is a

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings (e.g., music) issued on a medium such as compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl (record), audio tape (like 8-track cartridge, 8-track or Cassette tape, cassette), or digital distribution, dig ...

by Malian singer and multi-instrumentalist Ali Farka Touré. It was recorded in sessions at Studio Bolibana in Paris, and at the London-based Cold Storage Studios and Garden Studios. The album was released by the UK-based World Circuit label and distributed internationally by

Mango Records Island Records is a multinational record label owned by Universal Music Group. It was founded in Jamaica by Chris Blackwell, Graeme Goodall, and Leslie Kong in 1959, and was eventually sold to PolyGram in 1989. Island and A&M Records, anoth ...

Critical reception

Reviewing the album for ''

The Village Voice ''The Village Voice'' is an American news and culture publication based in Greenwich Village, New York City, known for being the country's first Alternative newspaper, alternative newsweekly. Founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf (publisher), Dan Wolf, ...

'',

Robert Christgau Robert Thomas Christgau ( ; born April 18, 1942) is an American music journalist and essayist. Among the most influential music critics, he began his career in the late 1960s as one of the earliest professional rock critics and later became a ...

gave it an A-minus and applauded its attempts to cross over in the form of "tracks colored with harmonica, saxophone, fiddle and bodhran, and the single-stringed njarka that Touré picks up for the finale--not to mention an extra edge of vocal command." Overall, the album offered a "variety, not compromise", that Christgau believed Touré had needed on his earlier recordings, which "drifted into the folkloric". In an interview for Guy Oseary's '' On the Record'' (2004), music entrepreneur and record collector

Craig Kallman Craig Kallman is an American entrepreneur and former DJ. He is currently the chairman and CEO of Atlantic Records. His career in music began in the 1980s as a DJ in Manhattan. He is the founder of the independent label Big Beat, which was establ ...

named ''The River'' among his 15 favorite records.

Track listing

# "Heygana" – 5:59 # "Goydiotodam" – 6:25 # "Ai Bine" – 6:21 # "Tangambara" – 5:22 # "Toungere" – 7:32 # "Jungou" – 7:23 # "Kenouna" – 5:02 # "Boyrei" – 5:23 # "Tamala" – 8:06 # "Lobo" – 6:44 # "Instrumental" – 2:59

Personnel

* Ali Farka Touré –

vocals Singing is the art of creating music with the voice. It is the oldest form of musical expression, and the human voice can be considered the first musical instrument. The definition of singing varies across sources. Some sources define sing ...

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external electric Guitar amplifier, sound amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar. It uses one or more pickup (music technology), pickups ...

acoustic guitar An acoustic guitar is a musical instrument in the string family. When a string is plucked, its vibration is transmitted from the bridge, resonating throughout the top of the guitar. It is also transmitted to the side and back of the instrument, ...

njarka The ''njarka'' ( Koyraboro Senni: nzarka) is a small fiddle made from a gourd, with one gut string, which is native to Mali Mali, officially the Republic of Mali, is a landlocked country in West Africa. It is the List of African countries by a ...

* Amadou Cisse –

calabash Calabash (; ''Lagenaria siceraria''), also known as bottle gourd, white-flowered gourd, long melon, birdhouse gourd, New Guinea bean, New Guinea butter bean, Tasmania bean, and opo squash, is a vine grown for its fruit. It can be either harvest ...

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a percussion mallet, beater including attached or enclosed beaters or Rattle (percussion beater), rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or ...

, vocals * Mamaye Kouyate – ngoni (tracks 3 and 7) * Rory McLeod –

harmonica The harmonica, also known as a French harp or mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used worldwide in many musical genres, notably in blues, American folk music, classical music, jazz, country, and rock. The many types of harmonica incl ...

(track 1) * Seane Keane and Kevin Conneff –

fiddle A fiddle is a Bow (music), bowed String instrument, string musical instrument, most often a violin or a bass. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including European classical music, classical music. Althou ...

and bodhran (track 7) * Steve Williamson -

tenor saxophone The tenor saxophone is a medium-sized member of the saxophone family, a group of instruments invented by Adolphe Sax in the 1840s. The tenor and the alto are the two most commonly used saxophones. The tenor is pitched in the key of B (whi ...

(track 3)

References

External links

''The River''
{{DEFAULTSORT:River 1990 albums Ali Farka Touré albums World Circuit (record label) albums