boubacar traore  Boubacar Traore.  Reviewer rating:  Rating: 4
out of 5 stars  The Playhouse November 17  TEMPERS nearly
sparked an international incident minutes into Boubacar Traore's
Australian debut. The finger-pointing and headshaking was
intense as harmonica player Vincent Bucher strode to meet the
sound tech. ''You call this a mix?'' inquired one outstretched
arm. ''Don't you know who this is?'' the other one demanded.
Traore is Malian music royalty and an enduring force of nature.
Shuffling in soft shoes, flat cap and a suit of dazzling African
checks and lines, the 70-year-old blues man could have commanded
the room solo and unplugged.  His amplified acoustic guitar was
a perpetual rhythm machine under the hammer and flick of one
finger and thumb. The rattling timbre and fluid, endlessly
unfurling lines were as hypnotic as Sufi spirals while invoking
a western history of the instrument from Blind Boy Fuller to the
Byrds to Richard Thompson. No rush, no flash, just the source of
the blues-folk family