Djékady – Featuring Balla Kouyaté and Mike Block

Name: Djékady – Featuring Balla Kouyaté and Mike Block
Start: 2025-10-12T16:00:00-04:00
Location: Bell's Brewery

Schedule

Sun, 12 Oct, 2025 at 04:00 pm

UTC-04:00

Location

Bell's Brewery | Kalamazoo, MI

Djékady is a collaboration between West African musician Balla Kouyaté and Grammy-winning cellist Mike Block. Their ensemble puts Malian music into conversation with American folk music and contemporary styles, allowing new shoots to sprout from his family’s musical tree.
Balla Kouyaté has been featured on numerous albums, including the Silkroad Ensembles’s "Sing Me Home" and Yo-Yo Ma’s "Songs of Joy and Peace". His music has been recorded for the Library of Congress and heard in venues like Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Symphony Space, and The Kennedy Center as well as festivals throughout the United States and Europe. As an educator, Kouyaté has offered masterclasses in universities and schools across the country, and he was chosen as a NEA National Heritage Fellow in 2019.
Mike Block is a Grammy Award-winning cellist, singer and composer with a passion for cross-cultural collaboration. Hailed as “one of the bravest, most intriguing musicians on the American fusion scene,” (Gramophone) he has been a member of the Silkroad Ensemble for nearly twenty years. Yo-Yo Ma calls Block “the ideal musician for the 21st century,” saying, “I’m always struck by his unique perspective on the world and his relaxed and confident approach; he takes on new music and new things fearlessly.”
------
Advance tickets are $17 general admission, $14 for seniors/active military and veterans, $5 for ages 25 and under, and $40 for families (2 adults + kids).
Tickets available at https://www.connectingchordsfestival.com/events/2025/djekady/
------
Running August 22 - November 30, the Connecting Chords Music Festival celebrates the unifying power of the world’s music. We strive to present a diverse array of artists, genres and venues each year with the mission of promoting community harmony, mutual understanding and respect among persons of different backgrounds.