Creative Uses of Low Tech in Bamako Recording Studios (Mali)

Résumé En

In Mali, the introduction of 3G in 2010, alongside growing access to affordable digital audio technologies throughout the 2010s, has transformed local music industries and generated the multiplication of recording studios based on Digital Audio Workstations (DAW). Using an ethnography of Bamako DAW studios, this paper establishes a theoretical framework and a methodology to remap music production studies beyond the limits of a Northern-centric narrative. This framework discusses the notions of high vs. low tech and hifi vs. lofi within the 2010s’ recording studio literature. Also, an indexation of DAW events complements ethnographic methods to analyze synchronized video and audio recordings, computer screen captures, and dialog translations of complete recording sessions. Drawing upon the detailed description of a tradi-trap production, this paper contrasts local discourses and uses of globalized technologies to challenge the notion of low tech in Bamako studios and to highlight the constraints and capabilities of DAW practitioners.