A few years ago I received a copy of a rare LP, "République de Guinée. Un peuple une musique. Volume 1", issued by the Guinean government in circa 1964/1965, pre-Syliphone. A collection of early Guinean orchestras, its disc label featured an icon of "M 33" (see below) with a matrix number of "12-1003". No recording label was apparent. More recently I received a copy of the ultra rare "Dansons à Conakry!" with the same disc label and a matrix number of "12-1002". This "M 33" icon was thus a clue, with it also found on the disc labels of the four volumes of "Les Ballets Africains de la République de Guinée. A chaque peuple, sa culture", which are 10" discs issued by "Editions Infoguinée".

Where "Dansons à Conakry!" names the orchestras and songs, "République de Guinée. Un peuple une musique. Volume 1" only named the songs, but the era is the same and the orchestras presented are similar and include Orchestre Feminine Gendarmerie Nationale (who shortly thereafter were renamed as Les Amazones de Guinee) and the pre-formations of Kélétigui et ses Tambourinis and Balla et ses Balladins.

"Dansons à Conakry!", with its sub-title "La Guinée: Un pays a vocation musicale", was the predecessor of "République de Guinée. Un peuple une musique. Volume 1" and contains tracks by "Orchestre de la Pailotte" (Kélétigui et ses Tambourinis), "Orchestre du Jardin de Guinee" (Balla et ses Balladins) and "Orchestre de Gueckedou" (Kébendo Jazz). The last track on Side B is by the "Sily Orchestre [National]" who perform "Sékou Touré l'histoire de Guinée tu sera reconnaissante". I had heard this track somewhere before, with its beautiful and understated melody and delicate horn section arrangements, but I couldn't quite place it...

I searched through the RTG catalogue for the song title and variants of it, but to no avail. I then used Shazam (!) and lo and behold it identified the song as from the CD "Afrolatin via Conakry", performed by Les Ballets Africains!!

Dear readers, Les Ballets Africains were not an orchestra which featured a horn section and electric guitars. No, they were a national dance ensemble which presented mostly acoustic music based on local traditions. It is quite appalling that the song "Sékou Touré l'histoire de Guinée tu sera reconnaissante" has been ascribed to them on the CD "Afrolatin via Conakry". It's sloppy and points to a serious lack of knowledge on the topic. Given the often appalling "research" that is grafted from the internet and presented in similar CDs as "fact", I thought I'd draw the line with this one, particularly as it is a very rare track performed by Guinea's premiere orchestra.

There are many other errors on the CD "Afrolatin via Conakry", which I have corrected, below. Many of the songs on its 2 x CDs are from early Syliphone discs but also featured are rare tracks from "Boum à Conakry".

Retruning to the LPs "République de Guinée. Un peuple une musique. Volume 1" and "Dansons à Conakry!", I doubt whether either was released to the public. It is likely that they were "promotional" recordings with pressings well under 1000 and perhaps under 100. The only copies I know of have come from the private record collections of VIPs of the era. Guinea's presence at the New York World's Fair 1964-1965 also looms large as a raison d'etre for their release.