Live Reviews
Bana's balance
By JASON RICHARDS
JEAN BAPTISTE FOJEBA with ADAM SOLOMoN
AND TIKISA , TAMZIR SECK and SHOW DO MAN
as part of the BANA Y'AFRICA WINTER FESTIVAL at the Tranzac, February
24. Tickets: $10. Attendance: 150. Rating: NNN
So I walked home and returned an hour later to Jean Baptiste Fojeba 's waterslide-smooth
Cameroon rhythms. The guitarist's 9-piece band flooded the hall with stomach-tickling, pillar-vibrating bass lines and kick/snare
thump. Fojeba plinked away adeptly, his repetitive riffs reverberating with the soothing French words of his assured tenor.
With its zouk bounce, Fojeba's set was more an exercise in consistency of quality . Still, he gets
respect for keeping a bunch of people dancing continuously during his set.
"I would like to invite everybody to dance with me," he announced in a rare stab at English. "I'm
going to show you how to clap your hands: one, two, three one, two, three." Counterpoint to the percussion going at the time,
it was a more complex beat sequence than it sounds, but the rhythm-conscious audience got it in seconds.
One spirited lady even ran out to dance directly before the charismatic Fojeba, beckoning him with
a finger.
"C'est très bien , madame!" he rooted.
It took much longer for Adam Solomon and Tikisa to get it together. Their sound check
was brutally long: "one, two, one, two..." into the mic forever. This can be forgiven because of the grand proportions of
the seven-piece ensemble, featuring Senegalese performer Tamzir Seck with a drum on his shoulder.
But once the mix was correct, they went nuts, banging out the end of the night with a jittery, yelpful pan-African sound,
stepping into compas and salsa territories along the way.
NOW | MARCH 2 - 8, 2006 | VOL. 25 NO. 27
