David Dalle
Thursday July 14th, 2022 with David Dalle
South African guitarist Derek Gripper live in studio! Sitarist Irshad Khan.

Today we welcome South African guitarist Derek Gripper who will join us to talk about his incredible music and perhaps even perform for us! Derek Gripper has had an extraordinary winding career as a musician, starting his education on the classical violin, later, he picked up the classical guitar. Gripper began playing bass guitar in a band, where he met the Indian percussionist Sivamani who invited him to India where Gripper spent some time learning Carnatic music. After his trip to India, he wanted to focus on the classical guitar and explore and stretch its capabilities. He had an eight string guitar made with a removable fretboards, so fretboards with different tunings could be easily switched in. He pursued different music and music theory. In 2011, this all led him to the kora music of Toumani Diabaté. Gripper's perspective change and he saw Diabaté as a composer as well as the famed musician and heir to generations of musicians. He developed a technique to perform Diabaté's kora music on guitar and transcribed his recordings into scores. He recorded his first album of Diabaté's music in 2012. In 2016, he was invited by Toumani Diabaté to visit Mali where he played with him and experience firsthand the tradition and way Griots approached and passed on their repertoire. This led him to a second album of Toumani Diabaté's music in 2016 which was more improvisatory than the first. Since then, he has expanded his reach with music by Salif Keita, Baaba Maal, Ballaké Sissoko and more. Derek Gripper will be performing tonight at Red Bird on Bank Street. Cellist Raphael Weinroth-Browne (of Kamancello fame) and guitarist Nathanael Larochette will also be performing sets. https://redbirdlive.ca/shows/page/derek-gripper-raphael-weinroth-browne-and-nathanel-larochette-july-14-2022 https://www.derekgripper.com/ https://newcape.bandcamp.com/