The group Ribab Fusion performs a fusion of jazz, Moroccan funk and Afropop on Sept. 27 at University Auditorium. (Submitted photo)

By Bill Dean
Entertainment editor

Even the most ardent aficionados of Afropop may not realize what’s hit them when the sheer exuberance of Ribab Fusion, the Moroccan funk/jazz/Afropop collective that melds traditional instruments and sounds with contemporary jazz, funk and pop grooves, washes over them like a musical tidal wave.

The group — which makes only its fourth concert appearance in the U.S. with Saturday’s performance at the University Auditorium — draws on the Amazigh (formerly known as Berber) culture of Morocco with its use of the ribab, a one-string instrument that’s similar to the violin.

What sets Ribab Fusion immediately apart from other performers of the instrument is Foulane Bouhssine, the group’s leader and acknowledged master of the ribab, whose prowess on the instrument has been likened to that of Jimi Hendrix’s on the guitar.

Joining the six-member Ribab Fusion for its inaugural American tour is Mehdi Nassouli, an accomplished player on another Moroccan instrument, the gimbri, a three-string cousin of the bass.

“The ribab is a very, very traditional instrument and a very old instrument also,” Nassouli says in a recent phone interview. “And the gimbri also is very, very old. Its string is intestine of sheep.”

Both Bouhssine and Nassouli, along with the group’s other members who play guitar, bass, drums and other types of percussion, have shown a knack for blending the traditional music played on such instruments with such contemporary influences as hip-hop, funk, jazz and rock ’n’ roll.

“We keep many, many traditional instruments like the gimbri, like the ribab. But in Morocco, we are very inspired by rap, bebop, jazz music and rock ‘n’ roll,” Nassouli says.

“And we’ve tried to mix our old culture with this sound. The idea is to keep the traditional music, which is very old and which our father left to us, and to mix this with the new sound, like jazz, like reggae, like salsa, all the new sounds of today,” he says.

“So now the concert that we’re doing in Gainesville will be traditional music with the drums, bass, keyboards, guitar and traditional instruments.

Formed in 2008, Ribab Fusion has built a following in Morocco and other countries in West Africa and bordering the Mediterranean with its approach, which has the group appealing to both young and contemporary-conscious music fans as well as older listeners who appreciate the group’s ear for tradition.

Somehow, the band’s seemingly boundless energy draws both constituencies, Nassouli says.

“There are many, many bands in Morocco. But the strength that we have especially with this band is that it (blends) the old thing and the new thing. Because in Morocco when Ribab Fusion play, the older people like it because they love the sound of traditional music, and the young people also like it because it has the new sound.

“It’s between the old culture and the new culture.

Contact Entertainment Editor Bill Dean at 374-5039 or at bill.dean@gvillesun.com, and follow on Twitter @SceneBillDean.