Dag Tenere are a Tuareg collective band of musicians aspiring to promote and preserve the culture and traditions of this nomadic people of the Sahara desert. They have a single release out now and an EP ready for early June.

Dag Tenere (ⴹⴶ ⵜⵏⵔ, Desert’s Children in Tamasheq) is a Tuareg blues band from Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso whose music, strongly influenced by the assouf or AKA desert blues, also aspires to promote and preserve the culture and traditions of this nomadic people of the Sahara Desert, the Kel Tamasheq, whose history dates back to ancient times.

Formed in Niamey, the capital of Niger in 2016, the band has been a collective of artists since its inception, each contributing their own expertise. Compositions by Goumar Abdoul Jamil (former member of Etran Finatawa) and Ibrahim Ahmed Guita are arranged together. In 2018 the band launched its first self-produced album Timasniwen Tikmawen.

Following that we have the EP Iswat to be released in June 2021 and teaser single Tihoussay Tenere, which is out now in all the usual places.

A lovely, lazy, bit of guitar picking and typically Saharan rhythm, taking its steer from the likes of Tinariwen and Bombino, this could be just the soundtrack to a brighter summer?

In Tamasheq, Iswat can be translated simply as “music”. In another conception, Iswat means a musical gathering around a female soloist who sings accompanied by a male choir.

It is a poetic ritual that the Tuareg have been practising since the dawn of time.

Iswat has been produced with the support of the African Culture Fund and with the backing of Nomada Music, this EP is the result of several months of work and the desire to give the best.

The result is an EP of just 17 minutes with 6 melodious tracks where Dag Tenere has managed to find the balance between tradition and modernity while keeping their own style.

Iswat will be released on 4 June 2021.