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On March 12 and 13 2005, more than 50 000 people gathered in Dakar's massive Iba Mar Diop Stadium to witness the greatest festival ever staged in Africa : The AFRICA LIVE Roll Back Malaria Concert. Jointly organized by Youssou N'Dour and other Roll Back Malaria partners led by the UN Foundation and the private sector, AFRICA LIVE The Roll Back Malaria Concert brings the finest talents of todays's African Music against the catastrophic malaria crisis to the attention of the world.

THIS HISTORICAL EVENT IS NOW ONE SPECTACULAR DVD AVAILABLE FROM APRIL 2006, STARTING WITH USA AND CANADA ON APRIL 4.

The AFRICA LIVE The Roll Back Malaria Concert DVD features top african artists like Youssou N'Dour, Salif Keita, Angelique Kidjo, Manu Dibango and many others. It offers more than 2H30 of live music ; the long version of the AFRICA LIVE documentary with live performances plus backstage comments from the artists and insights into the organisation of the event in Dakar ; the official UNICEF's Roll Back Malaria film presented by Angelique Kidjo ; 5.1 Dolby Digital.

Upon the release of the AFRICA LIVE dvd, Youssou N'Dour granted us with an exclusive interview. Here he talks about the repercussions of the festival and its future.

A bit more than a year after the festival, what are your feelings about the whole Africa Live experience ?

It’s a lot of things but mainly that we have succeeded at what we had settled for, which was communication. The goal was to amplify the message which, in my opinion, wasn’t very well perceived neither by populations nor by key people. Through the artists, we were able to explain that in Africa, malaria kills more than aids and i think that now, the message went trough.

Which means the festival clearly had some repercussions ?

I don’t know if a line can be drawn, but so far this year, the United States decided to give $ 5 billion to fight malaria. Japan offered to give 10 million moquito nets. And most important of all, people are talking about it. I’m not saying that we started it all but i sincerely believe that Africa Live had an impact. Our main goal was for people to realize that malaria kills more than aids. It is now taken for granted… We also had to involve key deciding people and it is also in the process. Even if it’s still not enough, i now see much more mosquito nets in Africa because of initiatives started by Africa Live : small concerts, associations that distribute mosquito nets. The concert we just organized in Dakar with Norway’s International Plan is a another concrete example.

Unfortunately, the whole topic is still very relevant…

Of course… I’m still spreading the word. We want to bring key executive people, those who control financial means to act for Africa. If Africa wants to survive, its children should be able to grow and go to school. At the moment we only have one cure : impregnated mosquito net. We need a lot of those, hundreds of million. We have to reach that stage when they will be distributed everywhere for free.

What was the audience reaction in Dakar ? Africa Live was the first festival of that stature ever staged in Africa…

African people were very impressed by the technical display and the quality of the show. It went on live on tv so we reached a very large amount of people. The organisation itself was nearly perfect. With 20 artists on stage each day, we only ran 2 hours late…

How did the artists reacted ?

Even though all the artists were africans they don't have much occasions to perform on their own continent. The extraordinary welcome that they got can be seen on the dvd. Some told me that it was their best show ever and that the audience’s reaction was fabulous. On an artistic level, it was a total success.

Viewing the diversity of styles brought by Africa Live, the expression «african music » sounds a bit reductive…

Well, they are musicians from Africa… African music is very rich and very diverse even if it comes from the same continent. I’d rather say that Africa Live gathered musicians from Africa each with its own vibe. For example Corneille does R&B and Tiken Jah plays Reggae… I for myself presented two aspects of my music during the concert.

Is it too soon to talk of a second edition

There will be an Africa Live 2. Something must be organized every year. In 2007, if everything goes right, we will organize the second Africa Live. Not only the audience loved it, the message went through but artists are asking for another festival. To consolidate the base and perpetuate the festival, i think we will stay in Dakar. Nothing is determined so far but i’m thinking of 100% african line-up. We want to show that, as always, we take our problems seriously.