Brotherhood, Destiny and Rum!

I took the plane from Dakar in Senegal to Praia, the capital of Cape Verde. On the plane I met a black American woman called Jaky and we shared a taxi into town. She asked me where I was going. “I don’t know,” was my reply. She recommended a hotel to me and I thanked her. I also told her that I was a musician and I was attracted to Cape Verde by the music. She promised to introduce me to a friend of hers called To Tavares, an eminent Cape Verdean musician and musicologist. My destiny had already begun on the aeroplane.

In Praia, you feel like you’re in Africa but not in Africa. For example, in Dakar there are always hordes of young people buzzing around you, trying to make a franc out of you. So naturally when I arrived in Cape Verde I was on my guard. But by contrast I found the people very relaxed, very dignified and respectful. No one invites you for a drink so that you pay for their drink, like they do in Senegal. They’re just looking for friendship. There were certain things that I had been searching for for a long time, and I found them in Praia.

I spent my first few days wandering around, discovering. Praia is the main town on the island of Santiago. It’s a very poor place, only barren earth and very little agriculture. But the scenery, the smells, the atmospheres, all affected me deeply. I was very touched by the fact that although they’re poor, the people are also incredibly generous. They sit at the bottom of their stairs and play the guitar… a little song, a little smile, a little hello, even if they don’t know you. In a way, I would really like to live that kind of poverty. Seriously! I think it’s an altogether honourable and honest kind of existence.

I met up with To Tavares and he gave me the address of Le Violin, a club where all the big musicians of Cape Verde who are passing through Praia because of the international airport come to play. It’s a small place, with seating for about fifty people, a small stage and a bar. Drinks are cheap and there are no bouncers. The musicians sit in on each other’s sessions, invite each other to come up on stage. There’s no jealousy, no complexes of inferiority or superiority. People dance and drink grog. Grog is made from sugarcane. It’s like African rum. I played there a few times, singing Kabyle songs which went down very well because they’re somehow similar to what people know. Maybe one of the strengths of Kabyle music is that it assimilates easily with other styles of music. Other musicians would just take their guitars and off we’d go.

One day, on my return from the beach, I was told that someone was waiting for me on the terrace upstairs. I went up and saw a small powerfully built man, simply dressed in shorts and an old t-shirt with a black complexion and a huge welcoming smile. His name was Lico Barros and he was an executive engineer working for the state electricity company. Whenever he passed through Tarrafal he always stayed at the Mar Azul. Apparently he had heard my music in reception and asked the receptionist what it was. “It’s a Kabyle singer,” came the answer. “He’s staying at the hotel.”

Lico Barros had been involved in the Cape Verdean struggle for independence from the Portuguese in the early 1970s. He was highly politicised and knew a lot about the Algerian war against the French as well. After Cape Verdean independence in 1975, when the country had become an archetypal African socialist republic, Lico Barros had often travelled to Belgium and Algeria to negotiate energy contracts. He had a lot of respect for Algerians, and Kabyles. He was also a musician and a lover of music. “I’d like to see what this Kabyle looks like. Can I meet him?” Lico asked the receptionist. “Of Course,” she replied. “He’ll be back in a while.”

That night Lico and I drank a few beers together and then ate at a local restaurant called ‘La Garetta” which was run by a member of his family. We talked about music and politics. It was not long before we were brothers. We felt like we had known each other for 50 years.

The next morning he told me that he was going to San Domingos, up on the plains above Praia, to see his family and did I want to come with him? “I’ll introduce you to my family,” he said. I said yes. So the next day we drove together to San Domingos in his car. It was a fabulous village, high up in the valley. Most of Cape Verde is very arid and rocky but up there the air is humid and there’s a lot of water. The mountains are covered with banana and mango trees. It reminded me of Kabylia.

Most of Lico’s family, his uncles, aunts, cousins, etc. live in San Domingos. He was the intellectual of the clan. Arriving with him was like arriving with the village chief. You’re received like royalty. I could walk anywhere I wanted and the people had complete confidence in me. That touched me very, very much. It was fabulous.

San Domingos is also the spiritual home of the morna. What really impressed me is that everyone has a guitar, often with only three strings instead of six. Materially they’re very poor people. But many of them have composed songs which are very well known throughout Cape Verde, even the world, and have been sung by Cearia Evora, Bana, Bao, etc. None of them have ever received a franc in payment of their rights. They’re just very generous people. The oldest and greatest amongst them was called Ana Novo, which means ‘New Year’. He’s a very great composer.

Every Sunday, musicians come to San Domingos from all over the island to play together and party. Fifty or sixty people turn up and gather in the village square under a big tree to sing and drink rum. So it was on a Sunday that I was there in the square playing my guitar and accompanying Lico who was playing my mandol. It’s a hard instrument but he looked like he’d already been playing it for twenty years. Others were joining in on guitar, on maracas. I was singing in Kabyle and they were accompanying me. A special bond of empathy was created between us.

At that moment Lico said, “Abdelli, why don’t you come and record your album here?” “Well I’d love to,” I replied. “I’d love to stay with you and just play but how? It’s too impractical.” Then Anan Novo, the spiritual master of that whole scene, said to me, “Yes but Abdelli, we’ll help you do it.”

And then the idea came to me. Everything seemed clear, right, full of promise. I would start the new album in Cape Verde. That was it. In that moment everything was decided. I had come to the island bearing a heavy suitcase full of sadness and uncertainty about my future as a singer and a man. I had come in search of relief and of music and I had also come to visit the frontiers of my Berber culture. But fate had lead me to Lico who in such a short time had become a brother, a friend. Through him and through his country, I found what I had been looking for. I knew what I had to do.