They came together in Timbuctou. Etran Finatawa is the only group in the world to combine the cultures of the Wodaabe and Touareg people from Niger, creating a wholly unique blend of "nomadic blues." Niger has served as a crossroads between the Arabs of North Africa and the sub-Saharan traditions for thousands of years. Located south of Algeria and north of Nigeria, it is an area of incredibly rich musical and cultural heritage. The Tuareg (renowned around the world as desert nomads) and the Wodaabe (distinctive in their colorful traditional dress and striking face paint) are just two of eleven tribes in the area. Despite different heritages and languages, Etran Finatawa, meaning "the stars of tradition," are the first ever group to use the songs and music of the Wodaabe in a modern context. The Wodaabe traditions add an incredible vibrancy to the music, with distinctive polyphonic singing and mesmerizing percussion adding another layer to the Touareg traditions. Together, they draw on their shared experience as nomads of the Sahelian savannah to produce an explosion of desert blues, full of acoustic percussion and haunting melodies.

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