[chorus singing] (narrator) in the countries of mali senegal, and gambia in west africa musicians knowngriots have traditionally played an important role in society as storytellers and historians. the griots sing songs and proverbs accompanied by astrument known as a kora a spiked harp with a gourd ronator. (brown) in many african cultures there aren't written traditions. i mean traditionally there weren't books, there weren't forms of wting and people needed ways of remembering things, of preserving their history and culture and values. and one of the ways in which they did that was through song. one example can be seen in the kora and the tradition of music that surrounds it. the kora is always accompanied by song, and those songs recount the deeds of heroes and kings, and these days, merchants and traders and other important people in the society. it's a repository of historical knowledge and also of cultural values. the kora tradition goes back several hundred years in west africa. it basically comes out of the old mali empi. the mali empire was founded in 1235 by sunjata the first