Blick Bassy
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Blick Bassy is a Bassa singer-songwriter from
Cameroon Cameroon, officially the Republic of Cameroon, is a country in Central Africa. It shares boundaries with Nigeria to the west and north, Chad to the northeast, the Central African Republic to the east, and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the R ...
. Bassy writes his songs in his native language, Bassa. His song "Kiki", from ''Akö'', featured as the theme song for the worldwide launch of the
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in 2015.


Early life

Bassy was born in Mintaba,
Cameroon Cameroon, officially the Republic of Cameroon, is a country in Central Africa. It shares boundaries with Nigeria to the west and north, Chad to the northeast, the Central African Republic to the east, and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the R ...
, one of 21 offspring from his father, a police chief. His mother was the youngest of his father's three wives. He began singing at the age of three, waking up at 5am every day to rehearse with the other children of the village.


Musical career

Bassy's band Macase toured Cameroon for ten years until winning the Prix Elysse Musique du Monde in 2001, which convinced Bassy to immigrate to
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,
France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...
. After performing in small venues, he secured a recording deal for his first two albums. The first, entitled ''Leman'', was released in 2009, and was followed two years later by ''Hongo Calling''. In February 2023, Blick Bassy was appointed co-director of the Memory Commission on Cameroon with Karine Ramondy, this commission is responsible for working on France's action in Cameroon during colonization and after Cameroon's independence. He performs singing and playing guitar with the French musician Clément Petit on the cello.


''Akö''

In 2015, he released the album ''Akö'', from which 15 seconds of "Kiki" were used in Apple's global advertising campaign for the
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. Bassy says that the album was influenced by
Skip James Nehemiah Curtis "Skip" James (June 9, 1902October 3, 1969) was an American Delta blues singer, guitarist, pianist and songwriter. AllMusic stated: "Coupling an oddball guitar tuning set against eerie, falsetto vocals, James' early recordings ...
, the American blues musician.
Robin Denselow Robin Denselow is an English writer, journalist, and broadcaster. Education Denselow was educated at Leighton Park School, a boys' Quaker boarding independent school (now co-educational) in Reading, Berkshire, followed by New College, Oxford, wh ...
, writing in ''
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'', says: "...his new album echoes the delicacy of bossa nova along with reminders of his other influences, from African styles to the Mississippi blues of his hero Skip James. This is an easy-going but experimental set in which he plays guitar and banjo, sings in the Cameroonian language of Bassa, and is backed by the unlikely combination of cello and trombone. He starts by showing off his distinctive voice on a cool, drifting late-night ballad, but then changes direction as he swings into a breezy song that sounds like an African answer to a country-blues hoe-down, before mixing Congolese influences with impressive, bluesy guitar work. A charming, intriguing set." David Honigmann in the ''
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'' describes the album's genre as manouche jazz, and describes "lubricious trombone slides" on "Kiki" and the "relentless Gypsy vamping" of "Wap Do Wap". He has toured globally performing at the
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,
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, in the Africa Utopia festival in 2015, and at
WOMAD WOMAD ( ; World of Music, Arts and Dance) is an international arts festival. The central aim of WOMAD is to celebrate the world's many forms of music, arts and dance. History WOMAD was founded in 1980 by English rock musician Peter Gabriel, w ...
in
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in 2018. He played the
Vancouver Folk Music Festival The Vancouver Folk Music Festival (VFMF), founded in 1978, is an outdoor multistage music festival, located at Jericho Beach, Jericho Beach Park on the west side of Vancouver, British Columbia. It takes place annually on the third weekend of Jul ...
in July 2018. Bassy's lyrics are in Bassa, one of 260 Cameroonian languages.


1958

Bassy dedicated this album to the memory of Ruben Um Nyobè, whom he considers one of his political heroes and was killed in 1958. The album presents as a comprehensive report of events during the 70 years since the death of Um Nyobè. The track "Mpodol" is Ruben's nickname and accuses modern Cameroonians of sabotaging their own homeland.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bassy, Blick Year of birth missing (living people) Living people 2001 in music 21st-century Cameroonian male singers Bassa people (Cameroon)