Singing to Mary in Senegal

Senegalese singer-songwriter Rémi Diégane Dio has practically devoted his musical career to choral singing. "I often say that it is the liturgical song that first came to me and I really thank the Lord for that. For they say that singing is like praying twice."

The songwriter is the author of 584 religious and secular compositions. He was also the first winner of the national music contest organized in 1984 by the Senegalese Copyright Office. A retired teacher, he is described by Maxime Mendy, choirmaster at the parish of Martyrs of Uganda in Dakar, as "a great library, a reference, and an inexhaustible source of talent in composing songs to the Virgin Mary."

A fervent devotee of the Virgin Mary, the guitarist points out that one day, after having sung in his native tongue at his own parish church of Saint Anselm in London, where he has been living for a few years, an elderly gentleman came up to him and said: "Even though I don't understand what you are saying, your song made me cry."

Rémi was one of the first to introduce guitar and singing in church in Senegal in 1968, with a song dedicated to the Virgin Mary. He learned to sing "on the job" by "staying up until the early hours of the morning watching older musicians play the guitar and enjoying the beautiful melodies." This learning was helped by a culture where "everyone sings or hums in the fields, and while going to the well to fetch water or gather firewood for the women." He also sees what he does as a gift from God, "in the sense that the Lord comes to everyone to make talent blossom."

Charles Senghor, in Dakar, La Croix