In Pictures: In Senegal, the kora ‘brings me closer to God’

Morning sun filters into the monastery church as the melodic twang of two harplike instruments – known as koras – fills the air, combining with the voices of two dozen singing monks. The music rises up the white walls and out through the latticework near the roof – lyrical, looping melodies filled out by warm bass notes.

The kora has been used across centuries by everyone from West Africa’s pre-colonial singing historians to modern jazz and rock groups today. 

But the kora was little known in Senegal outside of the minority Mandinka ethnic group before the monks of Keur Moussa Abbey started using it. In the 1960s, when the Roman Catholic Church was modernizing and just after Senegal had shaken off French colonial rule, the monks of Keur Moussa embraced the instrument, morphing their Gregorian chants into songlike prayers accompanied by the kora.

“It was work – it didn’t just happen,” says Brother Marie Firmin Wade, who builds koras. “That’s what has created all the liturgical richness of Keur Moussa. Because Keur Moussa has taken a bit from everywhere.” 

Congregant Hélène Ngom, walking out of a recent Sunday mass, says, “It’s an instrument that when you listen to it, it takes you. When I listen to the kora, I rise, divinely. It brings me closer to God.”

Guy Peterson

Brother Firman adjusts the leather collar on the neck of a kora with the original tuning mechanism.

Guy Peterson

A mural at the abbey shows French monks receiving the gift of a kora from members of the Mandinka ethnic group. Senegalese monks can be found giving kora lessons across West Africa.

Guy Peterson

Brother Marie Firmin Wade builds koras in the workshop. Over the decades, the monks have modernized the ancient instrument’s design – adding pegs in place of the leather straps to make it easier to tune. This has contributed to its popularity among jazz and rock musicians today.

Guy Peterson

A kora awaits repair in the workshop. The abbey fixes and modernizes koras from all over the world.

Guy Peterson

A monk at the abbey in Keur Moussa, Senegal, carries his kora, a West African harp-lute, after playing it for mass. Over six decades, the monks have melded Gregorian chant with the kora.