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I Assi Dida
Bella Bellow
Gbeme Ho
Gbe Agossi


Pretty  1980

Ninivé
Afiwa
Na Nde

(unavailable): "This album was for the African market," says Angelique Kidjo. "I recorded it in France and went back to Africa, where it sold 200,000 copies. I never got a penny for it because the co-producer ran away with my master tape and never gave me any money. I moved to France three years later, and I arrived at the French ASCAP [office]. They told me that the co-producer had put his name down as the writer of the songs. I had to redo everything. I continued working with different people, and when I met my husband, we decided to produce our own music."

 

 

 

Alindjo
Zanku
Doliéo
Agossi
Kpéti-Kpéti


Parakou  1990

Gogbahoun
Bléwu
Yonnoun
Tanyin

(Open/Island U.K. and France; available in the U.S. as an import): Says bassist/producer Jean Hebrail, Kidjo's co-writer and husband, "The jazz keyboard player Jasper Van't Hof appears in a very intimate track called 'Blewu.' "

Adds Kidjo, "This album got me the Island contract. Someone sent it to Chris Blackwell, and he sent a fax: 'Chase her down; she can be in a hole up there, I don't care. Chase her down!' I still have the fax. I was playing in a Paris club called New Morning, and suddenly the heads of Mango in France and England were both there, right in front. I had tried to attract their attention for a long time, but no one had answered. Chris had sent them.

"This is the first album my husband and I produced. This was the first production where I got into the technical part, which I don't like at all. We didn't have much money and the label, Open, belonged to the head of the jazz school where I was studying at that time. It was also a production with people from my jazz school, so you have a lot of jazz influence in there. Parakou was named after a village in northern Benin, and it was the first step of bringing in my experience from traditional to modern."

 

 

 

Batonga
Tché-Tché
Logozo
Wé-Wé
Malaïka


Logozo  3/9/91
(means tortoise)

Ewa Ka Djo
Kaléta
Elédjiré
Sénié
Ekoléya

(Mango/Island): Says Hebrail, "Recorded in Miami, produced by Joe Galdo [Miami Sound Machine], this LP represents the first step of Angelique's international career. The song 'Batonga' charted in various countries. American saxophonist Branford Marsalis appears on the track 'Logozo,' which gives its name to the album: 'Listen to the song of the tortoise/She lives alone, folded up in her shell with no one in whom to confide.' "

Says Kidjo, "This was my first Island release; the contract was signed in France. What I really appreciated was that before I signed, Chris Blackwell came all the way to Paris to meet me."

 

 

 

Agolo
Adouma
Azan Nan Kpé
Tatchédogbé
Djan-Djan


Ayé  3/21/94
(means life)

Lon Lon Vadjro
Houngbati
Idjé-Idjé
Yémandja
Tombo

(Mango/Island): Hebrail says, "This album was recorded by David Z in Paisley Park Studio and by Will Mowatt in Soul II Soul studio. It combines high technologies and deep African culture. The video of the first single, 'Agolo,' was nominated for a Grammy Award."

Kidjo says, "Aye is a long story. After Logozo, I decided I had to have a baby. We were lucky that nature said yes. In the middle of Logozo, I got pregnant, and it gives you a voice like nothing else in the world can. I wish I could have that voice all the time. 'Agolo' came to me just like that. One day I was putting my garbage out and thought how two days before, the garbage can was empty and now it's full. We're talking about nuclear waste and pollution, but we are consuming like hell. I realized, 'Oo la la, I have to back up and go inside and find a way of bringing my contribution for the sake of mother nature and for my daughter coming into this world."

 

 

 

The Sound of the Drums
Wombo Lombo
Welcome
Shango
Bitchifi


Fifa  3/8/96
(means peace)

Fifa
Goddess of the Sea
Akwaba
Koro Koro
Naïma

(Mango/Island): This is Kidjo's first album with English-language lyrics. Says Hebrail, "Fifa was produced in a very special way. Angelique wanted musicians from her own country, Benin, to contribute to her music. The first stage was to search for the rhythms of her childhood. Armed with an 8-track recorder and some microphones, we traveled to Benin to meet the traditional players of cowbells, flute, bambou, background singers, berimbau that Angelique was so fond of. Back in Paris and then in London, Los Angeles, and San Francisco [with Carlos Santana], the new technologies of music recording enabled Western musicians to play together with the African ones. To Angelique, this album represents an attempt to share a part of her culture with music lovers all over the world."

Kidjo says, "Fifa was a great time, too. This project had been in my head since I was a little girl, when I first discovered music that came from the Western world. All I knew before was the drum, the calabash, the cowbells. I heard Western music on the radio, but I didn't know how they made those sounds until my brothers started their own group and my father bought them the instruments.
"We recorded the whole percussion part of the album outdoors and during ceremonies, and sometimes we found schools and went in them because of the acoustics. Then, I took the DATs and went back home to write."

 

 

 

Introduction
Voodoo Child (Slight Return)
Never Know
Babalao
Loloyé
Itché Koutché


Orémi  6/16/98
(means my friend)

Open Your Eyes
Yaki Yaki
Give It Up
Orémi
Orubaba
No Worry

 

 

 

Summertime
Voodoo Child (Slight Return)
Agolo
Fifa
Batonga
Wombo Lombo
Malaïka
Open Your Eyes - feat. Kelly Price
The Sound of the Drums


Keep on Moving
The Best of Angélique Kidjo
5/15/01

Adouma
Naïma - feat. Carlos Santana
Tourmer La Page
Babalao
Agossi
Idjé-Idjé
Tombo
Wé-Wé
Sénié

Thanks to my fans and to all people who worked with me and supported me through the years.

In all the years since I first began singing, I've never performed a song that I didn't love. Each one feels like a baby of mine: it has its fragility and its strength, and I will never forget it because it's a part of me. But as with everything you truly love, you have to let it out into the wild!

Singing, and especially singing for an audience, has been such an ecstatic and intense pleasure for me. It's my hope that you'll share this deep experience while listening to these tracks. Each one of them brings back memories from very different parts of my life. Malaika, for instance, which I started singing when I was nine years old in my brother's band, reminds me of my first concerts in Benin, and my passion for Miriam Makeba, who was my role model.

A lot of these songs take me back to the places and the circumstances of their writing, and to the people who believed in me, especially my family in Africa, for whom, along with my soulmate Jean, music has always been a "family thing." And I will never forget the fans everywhere in the world who came to the shows, and the producers and many musicians who shared their good advice and played so masterfully.

Most of all, this music makes me feel closer to what has been my main influence: the traditional music from my country Benin and its region. Music is not only emotion and groove, it's something that speaks for a culture and its people. I hope that when you listen to this very diverse material, where the influence of many styles and other artists can be found, that you will hear a voice of the continent that I am so proud to come from: AFRICA.

Angélique Kidjo

 

Bahia
Iwoya
Olofoofo
Tumba
Black Ivory Soul
Refavela


Black Ivory Soul
3/19/02

Iemanja
Afirika
Okan Bale
Ominira
Mondjuba
Ces Petits Riens

Angélique is more than just one of the world's best-loved African singers -- she is a musical ambassador for her country, Bénin, and indeed, for the entire African continent. Kidjo has crossed musical boundaries by blending the tribal and pop rhythms of her native West African heritage with a variety of styles, including funk, salsa, and jazz. On Black Ivory Soul, Kidjo explores the musical and cultural kinship between Africa and Brazil, specifically her homeland and the province of Bahia. She is joined here by a stellar, multinational group of musicians from Brazil, Africa and the USA.

 

Seyin Djro
Congoleo
Bala Bala
Oulala
N'yin Wan Nou We
Conga Habanera
Le Monde Comme Un Bebe


Oyaya!  5/4/04
(means joy) 

Mutoto Kwanza
Adje Dada
Djovamin Yi
Dje Dje L'aye
Macumba
Bissimilai

OYAYA! means "joy" in Yoruba. It's the third part of a trilogy that previously explored African roots in music from the US (Oremi) and Brazil (Black Ivory Soul). OYAYA! fuses African and French lyrics to music that draws upon musical traditions of the Caribbean Diaspora. 13 original songs in a variety of indigenous Caribbean styles, including salsa, calypso, merengue, and ska.

 

Numerous soundtracks and compilations, including:
Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls on a song called "Ifé." "Ifé" means love in Yoruba.
Tina Turner on Aida, "Easy As Life" (background vocals)
Amazing Grace (a beautiful rendition of "Summertime")
World Christmas ("Zan Vévédé," which is "O Holy Night," again very serene)
Philippe Saisse's Halfway 'til Dawn, released 9/99, "La Vie"
Cassandra Wilson's Traveling Miles, a tribute to Miles Davis, "Run the Voodoo Down"
Jean Luc Ponty's Tchokola
Wonders of the African World, "Sou"
African Fantasy by Trilok Gurtu from India, "African Fantasy" and "Africa Con India"
Beat of Love by Trilok Gurtu, "A Friend"
Sol de Liberdade by Daniela Mercury (a Brazilian star), "Dara"
Future Tribe by Yulara, "Future Tribe"
African Playground (Putumayo), "Battu"
House Party by Dan Zanes & Friends, "Jamaican Farewell"

Please note that it is getting difficult to add every compilation AK appears on. A good source is www.towerrecords.com. I wnt to focus mainly on her own work but will always inform you on the main page when new appearnaces arise.

 

Song Info for Angelique Kidjo's Oremi

"Voodoo Child (Slight Return)": This is the album's first single and a tribute from an African voodoo child to an American voodoo child, Jimi Hendrix. The track injects Angelique Kidjo's vibrant energy into the guitar god's juicy '60s funk ‹especially those jubilant, yelping arias. But Kidjo wisely sidesteps the original's searing six-string passages. "The first time I heard 'Voodoo Chile' was seven years ago," says Kidjo. "I was in Paris, listening to Sting's live album, where he made that cover of 'Little Wing,' with a Beninese friend of mine born in France. I said, 'Wow! This song of Sting is great!' He said, 'Are you crazy? It's not a Sting song; it's a Jimi Hendrix song!' I listened to the real version of 'Little Wing,' 'Purple Haze,' 'Castles Made Of Sand,' and 'Voodoo Chile,' and from the moment he put on 'Voodoo Chile,' I couldn't move. He asked, 'What happened to you?' I said, 'This song is calling me somehow.' If one of the biggest rock'n'roll stars can call himself a voodoo chile in the '70s, he somehow felt that the way he plays came from far away. And the lightning behind what he plays! That's why I didn't have guitar in my version of 'Voodoo Chile.' No one can play that guitar for me, so my tribute to Jimi Hendrix was to do everything but the guitar."

"Never Know": A collaboration between Kidjo, husband Jean Hebrail, and Robbie Nevil, this track features Cassandra Wilson's cool and delicate background scatting. "Sometimes we're too laid-back," Kidjo explains. "We think, 'I have time to see my mother or my brother,' and suddenly you hear that she or he died. My grandmother passed away when I was here, doing promotion for Fifa. The inspiration is that you never know and also what she always told us: 'Never, ever think about suicide, because life is a gift.' So, I was thinking about her and about youth who kill themselves because they don't have anyone who understands them. Terrible, a waste."

"Babalao": Co-written by Kidjo and Hebrail, this song addresses the sadness of that lack of understanding." 'Babalao' means 'the voodoo priest' in Yoruba," says Kidjo. "In Africa, when young people do something wrong, we have a babalao to talk to. We ask him, 'Can you please talk to my parents or I'll get a big kick.' And he says, 'What did you do? Now talk to me. Why did you do that?' He tells you to think before you do something. It's somebody who's out of the family who you'll talk to more than your parents. That helps a lot. The youth in the world don't have that much; the black American youth don't have that at all."

"Yaki Yaki": Kidjo's infectious humor is on full display in this song, the title of which is how she describes the sound of her own laughter, which is set off frequently, "especially when someone has the pretension of being better," she says. "When you fall, I go, 'Yaki yaki yaki yaki!' My mother says, 'You laugh like men in the bar! It's not a feminine laugh; I don't like that!' I'm saying in that song that everyone comes on this earth with something different to do. We are all the same, but we are each unique. So don't pretend you know better than anyone else."

"Loloye": The word is another of Kidjo's linguistic creations, devised to describe the shame of men who "beat women in the name of love," she says with heat. "I say love is not a jail. If you love that person, set that person free."

"Itche Koutche": Kidjo addresses sins on the distaff side in this song, the title of which means "bad behavior" in Yoruba and which features Branford Marsalis' saxophone. The tune was inspired by a backstage all-girl chat fest in which a friend of her American backup singer "was saying that she was bringing her new boyfriend home to meet her mother," Kidjo recalls. "She said, 'But before I introduce him to my mother, I have to ask him how much he earns.' I went, 'What! You're not going to ask him how much he loves you?' She goes, 'That is secondary.' I realized that my way of seeing love and wedding is completely different from some people in America."

"Open Your Eyes": Up-and-coming American R&B singer Kelly Price duets with Kidjo on this stirring track, which is in the tradition of Marvin Gaye's landmark "What's Going On?" "It was written two years ago," says Kidjo, "the first song of this project. The idea started in Spain, and the writing happened in France. Extreme right-wing things were happening in France, and I was thinking that people look out their windows but don't realize that there is more out there than what they see. I was also thinking about me and [U.K. singer] Seal: We're both from Africa, but I'm born and raised in Africa, and he's born and raised in London. Both of us come into the world saying we are all the same. We have to try to travel and see the other people that make up the world who are seeking the same things -- happiness, love, and peace. Sometimes you have to pull yourself by the hand and open wide your eyes to appreciate the world without any preconceived ideas."

"Give It Up": Written by Kidjo, Hebrail, and Keith Cohen, this song speaks to the human need to share emotional burdens. "That song came to me by watching people go, 'I have no help,' " says Kidjo. "Talk! Why don't you give it up? Talk! Even if someone can't help you, he'll drop a word that will help you."

"Oremi": That theme of mutual support continues in the lyrics of the title track, penned by Kidjo, Hebrail, and Cohen.

"Orubaba": Meaning "Almighty darkness" in Yoruba, the song speaks to our irrational fear of the dark. "Most of the time we don't even take the darkness and night as part of our life, but if we didn't sleep in the night, we'd be dead," says Kidjo. "The song tells us to learn how to love the darkness as the daytime."

"No Worry": The set closes with this consoling lullaby penned by Kidjo, Mr. Mellow, EZ Cut, Nevil, and Hebrail and featuring Kidjo's mellifluous English-language rap. "This is for somebody who wants to die because a man promised her he was going to be in her life forever, and he's gone," says Kidjo. "I'm telling her, 'Why should you cry? What's meant to be will be. If this man is meant to be in your life, he will come back. If he doesn't, he's not for you. You were meant for a bigger happiness coming."