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Episode: Interview with Volker Goetze
The mutual admiration society that is Ablaye Cissoko and Volker Goetze owes itself to a serendipitous meeting that took place in 2001 at the African-European Jazz Orchestra rehearsals in Saint-Louis, Senegal, where they'd been invited to open for Senegalese legend Youssou N'Dour. Despite any cultural barriers that separated them, the Senegalese singer/kora player and German-born trumpeter discovered they had much in common, both musically and personally. Their commonalities can be heard on Sira, which is an album that reaffirms the maxim that music is the universal language. The album released in October 2008 to great critical acclaim, hitting #2 on the CMJ World Music Charts. This is their USA debut and first world tour together.