Ali Farka Toure died yesterday

Renowned Malian guitarist Ali Farka Toure died yesterday at the age of 66 (or perhaps 67). Toure was from a small town close to the near-mythical city of Timbuktu and once said this about his home: "For some people, Timbuktu is a place at the end of nowhere. But that's not true, I'm from Timbuktu, and I can tell you that it's right in the centre of the world."
I had the great pleasure of meeting him once (even more so because we were in Timbuktu at the time). It was a few days before new years eve 1999 and I was there shooting a story for the New York Times on "new years eve fests around the world" and he was there to play a concert for tourists who had come to ring in the year 2000 at the end of nowhere . Of course, other than a concert by renowned malian guitarist Ali Fark Toure, there really wasn't anything going on in Timbuktu on a cool evening in the middle of ramadan. Happily, Toure, being the magnanimous soul that he was, was inviting the whole town to the party. Sadly, the guys at the door weren't honouring those invites and those of us without tickets were left wandering the streets of the city at the end of nowhere. And that's how I ended up in a seedy little bar with a writer named Nori and 85 peace corp volunteers. After almost burning the place to the ground with our ring-in-the-new-year sparklers we stood around marvelling that our digital watches had survived the y2k meltdown and mourning our exclusion from the biggest show in town. I'm still bummed that I missed Toure's show that night, especially now that I'll never get another chance.