When Baye was 16, he caught the attention of a singer named Adja Soumouno, a successful traveling musician. Baye joined her on the road, performing in Mali and other West African countries such as Togo, Cote d'Ivoire and Senegal. They played for whatever they got and stayed with families along the way. He had become a professional griot.
In 1997, Toma Sidibe — a white French singer/guitarist with a penchant for African music — came to Bamako to record some music. Baye knew his kora player, and was quickly enlisted for the sessions. That led to Baye having a five-year stint in Sidibe's band, recording and touring throughout the world. Baye relocated to Paris but spent considerable time back in Mali.
"This guy come to me in Mali and say, 'I don't understand you,'" Baye recounts. "'I see a lot of people go Europe one time and when they come back they acting like someone who lives in France. Always when I see you, you the same, you didn't change. Why?'
"I tell him everyone thinks Africans who live in Europe and America have everything. But they work like animal, and they poor and miserable. I have to sacrifice in life to make this happen. The people, they watch too much TV. They think in America you walk in the street and you take the money and you become rich. I think when I go back to Mali, I need to show good example. I wear the traditional clothes. But the people, when you come back, they say 'I want this, I want this, I want this, I want this.'"
On Feb. 14, 2004, Baye flew from Paris to New York to visit a childhood friend from Mali. Soon after, Sidibe's manager called to tell Baye of an upcoming tour in Egypt. "I ask him, 'How much you gonna pay me?" Baye recalls. "The money was very small. I said, 'I cannot always touring with you if the money is like that. Now I want something more, and if you cannot pay me the money I ask, I cannot go.'"
Baye didn't go. Instead, he hung around New York, picking up menial jobs and meeting musicians in his inviting, guileless fashion. He taught himself bits of English on the fly.
Baye made a connection with the owners of Zebulon, a hip venue in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. They offered him a gig. One problem: Baye didn't have a band. He had met the kora player Yacouba Sissoko, who was able to enlist a couple of other Malian musicians. The quartet took the stage on a weeknight, having never played together. No problem: As griots, they shared the common musical language of their homeland. Zebulon was crowded but not packed. "At the end of the night, it was clear that everyone enjoyed it," says Zebulon co-owner Jeff Soubiran. "We knew we'd have them back."
They christened their band Les Tougarakes (The Nomads).
Baye sits on the sofa next to Annette, an arm draped around her shoulder, the other hand absently twisting one of his short dreadlocks. She's Cuban-American and grew up in Atlanta. While visiting New York in 2006, she dropped into a Brooklyn nightclub and saw Baye playing in a pick-up drum ensemble along with a DJ. After they finished, she bought the drummers a round. That impressed Baye.
The two stayed in touch, and before long they were smitten. Annette and her boys spent last summer with Baye in his Brooklyn flat. When it was time to return to Tampa, it was only natural that Baye come along.
In due course, she took over the business of his career. "I feel a desperate need to promote his music," she says emphatically. "I can't fathom that people wouldn't hear him."
The family heads to Brooklyn in June, but Baye will be glad to return to Tampa in the fall. He has not found local musicians all that welcoming — Baye's asked to sit in a few times and been told no — but he doesn't seem bitter about it.
Overall, "I can be the only one black person in the place, and the people always talk with me; they don't look at me like I'm shit," he says. "I'm so happy here. It's relaxed, like in Africa. I see a lotta trees, lotta sun. And the temperature is good."
