Though she unquestionably draws from the same Malian musical traditions as legendary griots like Ali Farka Tour‚ and Baboucar Traor‚, singer and guitarist Rokia Traor‚ has managed to distinguish herself from other Malian musicians thanks to her startlingly eclectic musical sensibility and her willingness to incorporate American, North African, and Middle Eastern flourishes into her nonetheless distinctively Malian sound. Her fourth album, TCHAMANTCHE, is her most stylistically diverse outing yet. On TCHAMANTCHE, Traor‚ is backed by an ensemble of veteran Malian players who subtly adapt traditional arrangements and instrumentation to match the jazzy cadences of Traor‚'s effortless guitar playing. Though Rokia debuts a number of striking original compositions on this album, her gently propulsive adaptation of Billie Holiday's "The Man I Love" is particularly exceptional.

Mojo (Publisher) (p.116) - 4 stars out of 5 -- "[She] plays African rhythms the way she imagines Chet Atkins or Duane Eddy might. Terrific."