Lamine Touré

Teaches at The Dance Complex

Lamine Touré www.laminetoure.com (African) Amadou Lamine Touré comes from a long line of griots, a caste of musicians and oral historians among the Wolof people of Senegal. Born into a family of griot percussionists, masters of the sabar drum, Lamine has been drumming and dancing since the age of four. Growing up in Kaolack, he received his early training as part of his family's drum troupe, performing regularly at weddings, baptisms, and neighborhood dance parties. In 2001, Tour é relocated to the U.S. to pursue his solo musical career and has continued to teach and choreograph sabar dance. Since Fall 2002, Lamine Tour é has been serving as Artist-in-Residence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he directs the Senegalese drumming ensemble, Rambax MIT. He also teaches sabar dance at Suffolk University. In May 2005, he co-wrote a pioneering composition with Evan Ziporyn entitled Sabar Gong for sabar drums and Balinese gamelan, which was premiered at the MIT Presidential Inauguration of Susan Hockfield. He continues to teach sabar drumming and dance classes in the Boston area, with ongoing dance classes at the Brazilian Cultural Center of New England and at Springstep in Medford, MA. He also conducts workshops and lecture-demonstrations at local schools and universities.