Winning the very first edition of a contest is the bet Mbaye Ababacar Diop, known as Mbaye Jop, has just pulled off in Senegal. Born on July 8, 2004 and originally from Saint-Louis, the artist won the Orange Music Talent (OMT) competition, a springboard launched this season to spot a new generation of Senegalese musicians.
Also on the podium of this first edition is Serigne Touba Samb, known as Liki Liki. Born on June 25, 2005 in Louga, he finished third with a firmly mbalax sound, while Mbaye Jop champions a genre he coined himself, "modern afro-folk" — a blend of traditional Senegalese sounds and contemporary production with international ambition.
Both artists are now carrying on outside the contest framework. Mbaye Jop is working on singles, an EP and a first album; Liki Liki, for his part, is preparing a track produced in partnership with the OMT. Le Soleil and Dakaractu, which have followed both winners since their run in the competition, describe a Senegalese scene carried by a generation as at ease on social media as with traditional instruments like the tama or the xalam.
No release date has been announced yet for Mbaye Jop's album or for Liki Liki's track. The premise of the contest holds for both winners: the OMT was built as a springboard rather than an endpoint, and it is now on stage and in the studio, far from the talent-show cameras, that Mbaye Jop and Liki Liki are playing out the next chapter of their careers.
