A multimedia performance documentary for Voice, African Harp (Kora), Chamber Music Ensemble and superDraw - which tells the legendary story of a Mande griot, Kimintang Cissoko, from the time he prayed that he could help alleviate the suffering of the Mandé people; through his encounters with African spirits and genies that ultimately led him to create the very first kora - Africa's lute-harp.

With superDraw, visualist Joshue Ott creates a carefully crafted dialectic between the aural and visual experience and the artistic intention is to evoke some sense of the powerful African spirit underlying the Kimintang - story in a way that makes it accessible and powerful to a Western audience.

Mandé Symphony was commissioned by the New York State Council on the Arts and is made possible in part with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, the Manhattan Community Arts Fund, supported by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council and administered by Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. 

Sponsorship was provided by the New York Foundation for the Arts.

The "Mande Symphony" - a multimedia music performance documentary tells the story of a Mande griot, Kimintang Cissoko, from the time he prayed that he could help alleviate the suffering of the Mandé people; through his encounters with African spirits and genies that ultimately led him to create the very first kora - Africa's lute-harp. My original composition is partly inspired by transcriptions I made over the years of griot music from West Africa, Fulani flute and full percussion ceremonies.

The one hour long Mande Symphony begins with a percussion ceremony played by a griot family in the projection video accompanied by the chamber ensemble performing a praise song of the griots in a contemporary choral arrangement and free psychedelic guitar, oboe d’amore and double bass improvisations. A documentary section follows introducing the audience to what a griot is before the actual mythical creation story of the African harp begins told by an actual griot and ancestor of the first kora player. The video sequences follow the linear story yet are destructed/painted in real-time being different each time in alignment of the living oral history of West Africa. Once the first traditional song ever played on the African Harp is established the work follows other musical sequences from Senegal and interviews by Randy Weston and Prof. Mamadou Diouf (Leitner Family Professor of African Studies and the Director of Columbia University's Institute for African Studies) always in relation to original compositions/songs written or traditional music arranged for the group.

The Mandé Symphony is the fruit of years I have worked as a composer/trumpeter with kora virtuoso Ablaye Cissoko. Our debut abum “Sira” in 2008 resulted in a unique musical synthesis that fused the timeless tradition of the storyteller/griot with a modern perspective setting out on a spiritual sonic journey, one that ranges from the desert and coast of West Africa to the urban landscapes of New York, which addresses themes of our ancient spiritual roots, and our hurried, dehumanized modern strife. I discovered the griot culture, which ultimately led me to produce and direct a feature-length documentary GRIOT sharing it with the world. Out of the research involved in the film project I stumbled over the mythical creation story of the African harp, which Ablaye’s ancestor assembled in the 13th century. This discovery provided the idea to create a work around the mythical creation. The work offers the audience a way into a different culture known to a western audience by the visuals, the English subtitled narration by Ablaye Cissolo and the composed music.