Dakar, June 20 (APS) – The research group on contemporary cultural expressions (GRE2C) of Cheikh-Anta-Diop University (UCAD) announced to the APS that it wanted to organize a “study day” of artistic work by Senegalese singer Adja Kiné Lam, Saturday June 29 at 9 a.m., at FASTEF, in Dakar.
The meeting will be held in the Kocc-Barma-Faal amphitheater of FASTEF, the faculty of sciences and technologies of education and training, a branch of UCAD.
“Adja Kiné Lam or rootedness and openness in traditional-modern music: pedagogy of beauty and didactic of good” is the theme of the “study day”.
The meeting will be chaired by the Secretary of State for Culture, Creative Industries and Heritage, Bacary Sarr, according to Mamadou Dramé, teacher at FASTEF and member of the event’s scientific committee.
“This [manifestation] will allow us to analyze the dimensions of the musical production of Adja Kiné Lam, considered the first woman to conduct a modern orchestra in Senegal,” states a document from the organizers.
Adja Kiné Lam, who has performed in several ballets, including that of the Daniel-Sorano National Theater in Dakar, has combined modern music with traditional music.
Kiné Lam Mame Bamba – his nickname – began his artistic career through theater.
In 1975, music fans discovered her voice with the title “Mame Bamba”, which she sang at the Iba-Mar-Diop stadium in Dakar, during a musical competition.
She began a musical career in 1977 and joined the Daniel-Sorano National Theater Company the following year.
With her first album, “Dogo”, which bears the name of her late husband, she reveals her talents in modern music, after having devoted her beginnings to purely traditional music, accompanied by instruments such as the tam-tam or the xalam.
Helped by her husband, the guitarist and conductor Cheikh Tidiane Tall, Adja Kiné Lam created the group “Kaggu” (the library) in 1989.
“The socio-discursive aspects of Kiné Lam’s repertoire”
According to Mamadou Dramé, the “inaugural dialogue” of the “study day” will take place between professors Amadou Sow, teacher at FASTEF, and Kalidou Sy, from the training and research unit in letters and human sciences of the Gaston-Berger University of Saint-Louis (north).
MM. Sow and Sy will discuss the sub-theme: “Around music as a didactic and educational tool”.
Three panels will be held during the “study day”, in the presence of several teacher-researchers.
“The work of Kiné Lam: a pedagogy of good”, and “the socio-discursive aspects of Kiné Lam’s repertoire” are the sub-themes of the panels.
The event’s scientific committee includes 21 academics from Benin, Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast and Senegal.
Teachers from Gaston-Berger, Cheikh-Anta-Diop and Assane-Seck universities in Ziguinchor (south) are members.
This third “study day” dedicated to Adja Kiné Lam follows those dedicated to the work of Thione Seck (1955-2021) in 2019 and to the career of Baaba Maal in 2023.
The research laboratory on educational systems of FASTEF, the department of linguistics and language sciences, the laboratory of African literatures and civilizations of IFAN Cheikh Anta-Diop and several doctoral schools of UCAD are taking part in the organization of this event.
FKS/ADL/ESF/BK
