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Boston's Kotoko Brass joins forces with Ghana's Mohammed Alidu on new album
Over the last decade, Kotoko Brass has established itself as one of Boston’s most unique and creative ambassadors of West African music. The band’s uplifting mix of traditional Ghanaian percussion with a horn section and Caribbean grooves has been heard everywhere from concert halls to the streets around Fenway Park.
Now Kotoko is breaking new ground with “Kalan Pini,” a collaboration with renowned Ghanaian percussionist and songwriter Mohammed Alidu. The record melds Kotoko’s eclectic sound with Alido’s devotion to preserving the language and stories of the Dagbani people of Northern Ghana. The record is out Friday, the same night that Kotoko and Alidu will perform at the Crystal Ballroom in Somerville, presented by Global Arts Live.
Alidu comes from a family of griots, known as lunsi in Dagomba, who trace their lineage back over 1,000 years. “Our traditional main instrument is the talking drum,” he explained on a Zoom call from his home in Ghana. “There's so much in our culture, from birth to marriage ceremonies to death, that we announce to the community.”
Kotoko and Alidu connected after Alidu moved to the U.S., where he was first based in Colorado and then in Connecticut. About a decade ago, his work took him to Boston, where he met Attah Poku, who — along with Kwame Ofori — plays percussion for Kotoko.
Both Ofori and Poku were raised in the Ashanti musical tradition. Poku was born in theAshanti palace in Kumasi, Ghana, and began training with his grandfather when he was five before becoming the lead drummer for the Center for National Culture. When Poku and Alidu connected in New England, they were able to exchange their different rhythms and musical cultures with each other. They also encountered another one of Kotoko’s founders, trap drummer Ben Paulding, who had studied with both percussionists while in Ghana.
The musical partnership was rekindled when Kotoko went on tour around the country. Alidu has since moved back to focus on his Bizung School of Music and Dance. Alidu is also an artist with Playing for Change, the long-running nonprofit that developed out of a viral video of street buskers from around the world playing “Stand By Me.” One of the dates on Kotoko’s tour was the Playing For Change Day Festival in Tamale, Alidu’s hometown.
“I told Kotoko that ‘I really want to start to write songs with you guys, because the energy feels so good and we are learning so much from each other,” recalled Alidu.
For Kotoko, the project is the latest chapter in a story that began when Paulding moved back to Boston after two years in Ghana. At the same time, Poku had started teaching at Tufts and Ofori was getting his masters in musical theater. It wasn’t hard for the three to find a way to jam together — they were all roommates.
When Paulding’s trombonist brother Brian crashed on their couch, the two brothers reignited old talk of starting a band, something that had never happened previously, “because he was a metalhead and I was a hippie,” laughed Brian. While Ghanaian music was the focus, Brian brought in some of his colleagues from Boston’s reggae scene, like M'Talewa Thomas, a local legend bassist whose lengthy resume ranges from Jamaican originators the Skatalites to New England groove favorites Entrain, keyboardist Yusaku Yoshimura and versatile saxophonist Andy Bergman. Guitarist Dillon Zahner brings in influences from Congolese soukous to Saharan desert rock, giving the band a pan-African feel.
What Kotoko doesn’t normally have is a vocalist. “The brass is a really natural extension that substitutes for the vocals,” explained Ben. “We bring in some elements of the West African brass band tradition, but our instrumentation is very different.”
And while Alidu has a lengthy discography of original recordings, this is the first time he’s been with a band that has a full-time horn section. “It’s beautiful. The horns feel like elephants! They bring in a positive vibration that reminds me of nature,” he said.
One of the songs, “Be Borimi Nin Yali,” was inspired by Alidu’s late brother Iddrisu Alidu, who was also a gifted drummer before he died in a car crash. Iddrisu would frequently be asked to play at cultural and community events that required a percussionist, but he wasn’t always fairly compensated for his musical gifts.
Alidu wrote the song after reflecting on what turned out to be the final conversation he had with his brother, who was also his musical mentor. When the band first tried recording the track, they had trouble getting it to gel. “I said okay, let’s call it a night,” Alidu recalled. “And some of the musicians left, and [one of the other] percussionists started to play something, and I started to sing, and the guitarist started playing something… And it just brought the song together.”
For Alidu, the talking drum and traditional dance still play a central role in the life and culture of his community, which is why he continues to teach both daily through his academy. “We teach how to understand the rhythm, how to understand what the drum is saying,” he said. “Knowing that the culture is a part of who we are.”
Kotoko likewise views its music as a mission, whether the band plays with Alidu and the Ghanian dancers who will be joining them this weekend or on their own. “Either way, it's an absolutely joyous dance party of community and fun,” said Ben.
“Kalan Pini” is out Nov. 21. That same night, Kotoko Brass, Mohammed Alidu and dancers Maltiti Sadik and Saeed Kuubetesuri perform at the Crystal Ballroom in Somerville at 8 p.m.
