Youssou N'Dour
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The king of the mbalax: from the Medina of Dakar to the world's greatest scenes, Youssou N'Dour has made Senegalese music a universal language.
Youssou N'Dour was born on October 1, 1959 in Dakar, in the Medina district, of a sister father and a groaning mother who sang from adolescence in family parties.
After the Dakar Star, he founded his own orchestra, the Dakar Super Star, in 1979, and imposed mbalax, a fusion of sabar percussion and world music.
In 1994, his 7 Seconds duo with Neneh Cherry became a planetary tube; he would follow collaborations with Peter Gabriel, Paul Simon or Axelle Red, and the anthem of the 1998 World Cup, La Cour des Grands.
The greatest distinctions hail his work: Grammy Award in 2005 for the album Egypt, Polar Music Prize in 2013 and Praemium Imperiale in 2017; he entered the Royal Swedish Academy in 2020.
In April 2025, he released the album Light the World — Light the World and continued to make festivals around the world vibrate at the head of Dakar's Super Star.
