The banjo is a key instrument in Western folk music -- from US bluegrass to Irish trad -- and over the past 20 years, research into the roots of this three-stringed instrument have revealed its west African lute origins, with two instruments, the ngoni and the ekonting, now understood to be the closest ancestors to the banjo.
Long-time readers may remember reviews of banjo virtuoso Bela Fleck's epic African journey to research and perform with lute players in his documentary and multiple CD release in 2009 Throw Down Your Heart (Rounder), and the work of ngoni master Bassekou Kouyate and his band Ngoni Ba on albums like the Grammy award-winning I Speak Fula. I also had the great fortune of listening to Ali Farka Toure explain the rhythms of his music through a ngoni (he was concerned that I was a bit "slow" in understanding what he was talking about, so he just took up the instrument and simply showed me).
