The concert of the group Tartit, songs of Touareg women, gave, Thursday, in the framework of the cultural season of the city, immersed 400 spectators into the world of nomads from the Sahara. By their song, music and their dance, these artists look for contact with the public, placing before them their culture.

Thursday night, on the stage of the municipal theater before 400 persons, the group Tartit acted as ambassador of the Tuareg culture. In semi-circle, seated robed, nine singers and musicians, of which five were women, dressed in traditional clothing, interpreted the music and songs of the nomads from the desert where they have lived in the Sahara for thousands of years.

The lyrics of Tartit, simple and rich with meaning, speak of war, peace, daily life, nature. And for the public to understand their meaning, the singers explained between each title, its significance, revealing their customs. Beginning by “Democracy”, they captivated with songs of love, jealousy among women, marriage, but also the sadness of a mother who has lost her only son in a refugee camp.

More cheerful, they described certain relations between men and women: “Flirting at home is not done like here. The woman is surrounded by men who speak poetically to her…according to our customs, a woman doesn’t have the right to be the lover of one man…it is too dangerous!”

LES FEMMES PILLIERS DE LA SOCIETE

Feminists, they dedicated a song to all women “who are the pillars of society in Tuareg society, as in the entire world. But the men must not interfere with them….” Without forgetting to pay hommage to the men a little later, and then to the camels. “We never forget the animals in our songs, it is our heritage. And the camel, it is the Mercedes to us, it is what we have that is most important.”

Echoing this sentiment that “our music, this is our contact with the public”, the spectators accompanied the singing by tapping the rhythm with their hands. And if several spectators rose to dance their turn, the singers, on the stage, regretted that “we can’t see the audience, one would think there was nobody. We didn’t realize that we would have liked light on the audience.”

Cries, laughs, interjections, clapping of hands, sounds of djembes and coras carried the Tuareg songs from the desert, accompanied by sensual dancing from the women, and more acrobatic movements from the men whose movements resembled that of hip-hop. The call was tonitruant, a Tuareg man and woman rhythmically clapped approval with their bodies. Always singing, Tartit thanked “all of our friends who helped us to be here”, thinking in particular of the Belgian worker who spotted them in a refugee camp in Mauritania, in the 1990s, and encouraged them to form a group; but also thanking the residents of Brive, who help the inhabitants of their country, Mali.

At the end of the concert, the audience could discover the arts and crafts of Tuaregs at the stand “Union of Sisters”, mounted by Tartit for the unemployed mothers of Mali and from this founded  the association of “Brive-Sikasso”.

An occasion to immerse oneself again a bit in the culture of these Tuareg men and women and to help them improve their communities.