Ashley Maher + Kaw Secka & The Kawson Band

A London evening pairing Ashley Maher, a Montréal-born singer and songwriter, with Kaw Secka and The Kawson Band, whose music draws on West African rhythms and Western song traditions.

Ashley Maher is a singer and songwriter born in Montréal, currently travelling from Los Angeles, whose songs blend the rhythmic impulses of West Africa and Latin America with the structures of Western song. This London night places her alongside Kaw Secka and The Kawson Band, two musical worlds whose links go back many years. The billing spans blues, country and folk, with mbalax and Afrobeat running through the newer material.

The evening opens with Ashley Maher performing songs from an earlier catalogue, then moving towards more recent work built on mbalax and Senegambian rhythms. Kaw Secka, described as a world-pop artist, then takes the stage with the same band, continuing the groove into mbalax, Afrobeat and Senegambian rhythms. The two sets run into one another, with a single band backing both artists.

The Jago, based at 440 Kingsland Road, mainly hosts concerts, and its programme is centred on live music performance. The night is aimed at listeners who enjoy rhythm, dance and song-stories, and it draws links between London, Los Angeles, Dakar and Banjul. It also marks Ashley Maher's return to London to meet UK supporters again, following a previous show at The Green Note.