Yacine Boulares’ AJOYO

Habibi Festival • Nov 2, 2021

Yacine Boulares, the Habibi Festival Co-Founder. Praised by Radio France International as “ A Tunisian in New York, one of the most talented jazzmen of his generation”, Yacine Boulares has composed, recorded and performed across the world with the likes of Placido Domingo, Tabou Combo, Vincent Segal and Nasheet Waits. His work explores folk traditions of North and West Africa perceived through the prism of chamber music and Black American Music. Yacine is the founder of the ensemble AJOYO and of trio Abu Sadiya.

AJOYO is a mystic brew blending African tradition, Jazz and Soul. More than music, it's a joyful ceremony, a fuller experience bringing musicians and audience close together. AJOYO chants in the name of Tony Allen, Oum Khalsoum, Charlie Parker and Donnie Hathaway. AJOYO speaks the language of the talking drum with a New York accent.

Based in New York and originally from France & Tunisia, Yacine Boularès has played sax, composed and arranged music for Cameroonian musicians such as former Fela Kuti drummer Jojo Kuo, for Martino Atangana, for the Haitian Kompa legends Tabou Combo, Orchestre Septentrional and for Placido Domingo’s latest album Encanto Del Mar. He is also the recipient of the 2015 French American Jazz Exchange for his album Abu Sadiya with Vincent Segal and Nasheet Waits, a Fulbright Laureate, a grantee of the Brooklyn Arts Council and of the Arab Fund for Culture and the Arts.

The project originated in these encounters and influences, as Yacine assembled a band that reconciles his North African and Western heritages. AJOYO features vocalist Sarah Elizabeth Charles and celebrates life, love and justice through socially conscious lyrics and music: music for the heart, the mind and the body, the kind that is soulful, sophisticated and that makes people want to dance.