WhatsApp recordings throw lifeline to Sahel artists

Malian musician Ali Traore (right) is seen setting his phone to record a new track in his courtyard in Bamako on Oct 26. — AFP

Ali Traore, dressed in black, sits down to record in his lively courtyard in Mali's capital Bamako, with children frolicking on the dirt ground between parked mopeds and stray jerrycans.

He starts to strum an acoustic guitar and sing of his longing for the desert dunes around his native Niafunke, a town in the centre of the turbulent Sahel state.