Dressed in a traditional white embroidered dress, the singer with her hypnotic voice, from the Azmari troubadour nomadic community, made her audience swing on pentatonic scales.

Percussion, drums, keyboard and bass accompanied him on stage with, in place of the electric guitar, an accordion and a Farfisa electronic organ.

Coming from the jazz, funk and traditional Breton scene, the bandmates of Badume's Band fell in love with the Ethiopian repertoire of the 1960s-1970s thanks to the work of rediscovering these strangely charming sounds produced by ethnomusicologist Francis Falceto, with his collection " Ethiopians".

"In the early 2000s, we were filming with the singer from Central Brittany Eric Menneteau who threw himself headlong into learning the Ethiopian language, music and culture," Antonin told AFP. Volson, the band's drummer.

After having toured with clarinettist Aklilu Zewdie, saxophonist Gétatchèw Mèkurya, the Bretons accompanied Mahmoud Ahmed, emblematic figure of "swinging Addis", this musical movement which ignited the nights of the Ethiopian capital during the period of cultural ferment of the 1960s. .

The Badume's band or the improbable meeting of Breton musicians and Ethiopian singer Selamnesh Zéméné, at the Vieilles Charrues festival, July 15, 2022 FRED TANNEAU AFP

"It's as if French musicians were asking to accompany Cesaria Evora. A great friendship was forged with Mahmoud Ahmed and they toured the world with this great star for years", laughs their producer Bertrand Dupont, co-founder of Innacor, a label in Central Brittany which defines itself as the "speaker of current music from Brittany and the world".

Then came in 2007 the meeting with Selamnesh Zéméné, a young woman from the highlands of Gondar, the former capital of ancient Ethiopia, who sang every evening in a famous cabaret in Addis Ababa.

"Since then, we have not lost sight of each other," says Antonin Volson.

-"crazy energy"-

"At the beginning, when we embarked on the adventure of Ethiopian music, we frantically took up this repertoire which mixed traditional music, influences of Afro-American and Cuban music to appropriate it with our instruments, our sounds" , continues the musician.

The Badume's band or the improbable meeting of Breton musicians and Ethiopian singer Selamnesh Zéméné, at the Vieilles Charrues festival, July 15, 2022 FRED TANNEAU AFP

The common point between the Breton and Ethiopian tonalities lies, according to him, in "trance, dance, oral tradition and the practice of singing against singing".

"Badume's is not a fusion between Breton music and Ethiopian music, it is rather music of excellence, very jazz, funk", comments Tangui Le Cras, member of the La Fiselerie collective, based in Rostrenen (Côtes d'Armor), which coordinates the programming of the Gwernig stage at Les Vieilles Charrues.

After touring on big stages and traveling back and forth between Brittany and Ethiopia, the group slipped "towards rock sounds" by performing in smaller venues.

Their 3rd "roots and rock" album, Yaho Bele ("say yes", editor's note), was released at the end of 2021.

"I told them + we're going to have to get out of ethio-jazz a bit + and we decided to take a slightly more trans, rock, gothic, psychic path", underlines Bertrand Dupont.

The Badume's band or the improbable meeting of Breton musicians and Ethiopian singer Selamnesh Zéméné, at the Vieilles Charrues festival, July 15, 2022 FRED TANNEAU AFP

The song, in the Amharic language, offers a large place for improvisation with poetic texts from a traditional repertoire that Selamnesh Zéméné reappropriates, the lyrics often having a double or triple meaning.

Considered one of the great female voices in Ethiopia, the artist still lives in Addis Ababa and returns to Europe regularly for tours.

"She's a pretty incredible singer, of rare power. She has a crazy energy on stage", assures Tangui Le Cras.

"She is quite reserved in life but, as soon as she goes on stage, she enters into communion with her audience and does not let go, whether there is only one person or 50,000 in the room", greets Bertrand Dupont.

© 2022 AFP