The stellar quartet featuring Ballaké Sissoko (kora), Vincent Segal (cello), Vincent Peirani (accordion) and Émile Parisien (sax), channel a multitude of influences to irresistible effect.

Malian musical royalty Ballaké Sissoko has spent many years making records with French cellist Vincent Segal that bring together Manding and European chamber traditions. Meanwhile, Émile Parisien and Vincent Peirani have worked together as a saxophone and accordion duo somewhere in the hinterlands of jazz and folk. In the new album Les Égarés (2023), meaning ‘those who have gone astray’, the two pairs combine and recombine in the art of cross-fertilising sounds and transcending genres.

Les Égarés reminds us of the rebelliousness that can be found in a spirit of concord and the extent to which the art of playing together with such fine intelligence can generate an extremely subtle way of lighting a fuse. In Les Égarés, they succeed in reordering the musical landscape to uncover lines of escape of a hitherto unheard beauty.

‘Sissoko, Segal, Parisien & Peirani conjure a musical impressionism in Les Égarés’ (Financial Times)

Recommended age: 14+