Born in 1943 in western Ethiopia, Mulatu Astatke first trained at the Trinity College of Music in London, and then at the prestigious Berklee School of Music in Boston, where he was the first African student. He returned to Addis Ababa in 1969, bringing with him all he had learned and heard, to create a new style by blending jazz, Latin music, and traditional Ethiopian music: Ethio-Jazz.

Throughout his long and fruitful career, Astatke has been a vibraphonist, percussionist, composer, arranger, teacher, and director. After the “golden age of the 1970s” in Ethiopia, Astatke’s music regained popularity in 1998 with the launch of the Ethiopiques series, and later in 2005, with seven of his tracks featured in Jim Jarmusch’s film Broken Flowers.

Familiar yet strange, simple yet complex, modern yet traditional, elegant yet enveloping, African yet Western, hypnotic yet evocative, his music is a blend of styles and cultures. Ultimately, it is a unique sound marked by a personal imprint that makes it easily recognizable but difficult to imitate.