Bobo Diolaso balafon

Bobo pentatonic balafon (Hauts Bassins region, Burkina Faso)

The old griots of the Senegal River Valley say that Sumaoro Kanté, the defeated King Soso, has been playing his old balafon among the ruins of Kumbi Saleh for a thousand years. He has been beating his eighteen sheets of wood for a thousand years, his gourds have been ringing for a thousand years waiting for times to change...
But... what the heck is a balafon?, some will ask, and the answer is simple: a balafon is a resonator and pentatonic xylophone that is used in much of West Africa to celebrate festivities or announce a mourning (that is a xylophone because it is a percussion instrument made up of between 16 and 27 wooden blades or keys; it is resonator because the sound is amplified by gourds; and it is pentatonic because it presents a succession of five notes within an octave).
The one we have at Black Market is the balafon with large gourds, wide blades and deep sounds that curves and rises towards the lowest keys, following the fashion of Bobo Dioulasso. It has eighteen sheets of wood (mansonia heartwood) and as many gourds equipped with a membrane (so that they vibrate like a kazoo) mounted on a wooden frame.

Length: 135cm; Width: 61cm; Height: 38 cm