Dudù Kouate was born in Senegal in 1963 into a family of griots, known for being the conservators of the African cultural and musical tradition. After his humanistic studies in his home country, he left for Europe. He lives in Bergamo where he has been teaching African percussions for many years. Since 2017 he collaborates on a permanent basis with the Art Ensemble of Chicago with Roscoe Mitchell and Don Moye.

He founded the duo »Pensieri Africani« with saxophonist Bergamasco Guido Bombardieri, as well as the trio Zayt and Komiel and regularly works with the Odwalla and Multikulti groups as well as many other italian and european musicians, on projects of Afro-jazz, modern, traditional and contemporary music.

Kouate holds seminars on the history of traditional African instruments, trying to trace the territorial boundaries of the populations and disseminating the African cultural tradition through musical fairy tales.

The constant search for sound (sound of elements) always pushes him towards new and interesting experiences in the world of music. Recognized validator of traditional instruments and especially percussion, he managed to find their insertion within diversified musical contexts.

In 2018 he released the album »Africation« in which Kouate plays the role assigned to him by tradition and makes him re-live in a modern and multicultural way: the songs are mainly sung in his mother tongue Wolof, with some reference to Bambarà phrases in French and Italian, and express an intense emotional charge also thanks to the use of new and original sounds. The Senegalese artist says »I was born a percussionist but over time I have also explored other string and wind instruments. This album is born from a need to start from myself, it is a kind of introspective journey that opens a new phase of my life.«

In addition to the lyrics of the individual tracks, what’s striking about »Africation« is the fact that it was shaped on a symphony of instruments, a polyphony that creates magical and re-evocative atmospheres: from the berber lute (xalam) to the kanjira, from the djembè to the traditional African wind instruments and to the didgeridoo that symbolically takes the listener into an unexplored and involving dimension.

Kouate takes the listener by the hand and with his perspective accompanies him on a virtual journey in the African sounds reworked with style and originality: the changes of rhythms and harmonies make the flight take off to the emotions. This perspective allows us to see, almost ideally, the suburbs of Dakar, the natural landscapes, the savannah, the desert, the villages and the stories of humanity.