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Ismaël Lô

Senegalese musician

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 18, 2026
Entity authorityQ471774 ↗
Source-derived summary

Ismaël Lô (also Ismaël Lo; born 1956) is a Senegalese musician and actor.

Life

Lô was born in Dogondoutchi, Niger on 30 August 1956, to a Senegalese father from wolof ethnic group and a Nigerien mother. Shortly after Lo's birth the family returned to Senegal where they settled in the town of Rufisque, near the capital Dakar. He plays guitar and harmonica, and has been called "the Bob Dylan of Africa".

In the 1970s, Lo studied at the School of Art in Dakar. He later joined the popular group Super Diamono, but left in 1984 to start a solo career. Over the next four years, Lo recorded five popular solo albums.

In 1988, he composes the soundtrack for Ousmane Sembene's Camp de Thiaroye and plays in it. He would also star in Moussa Sene Absa's film Tableau Ferraille (Iron Landscape), in 1996, and compose more soundtracks.

In 1990, Lo signed a recording deal with Barclay and recorded in France his seventh solo album, Ismael Lo.

Editorial summary

“Ismaël Lô” enters the record as senegalese musician. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Ismaël, Senegalese and musician can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1956, 1984, 1988, 1996—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1956-08-30. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Ismaël, Senegalese and musician.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Ismaël Lô” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Ismaël, Senegalese and musician provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q471774. VIAF identifies the subject as 39565985. The Library of Congress control number is n92076244. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1956, 1984, 1988 and 1996.

Critical limits

Public reputation and documentary evidence do not always develop together; absence from a summary is not evidence of historical absence. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Ismaël Lô”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Ismaël Lô primary sources, Ismaël Lô archive and Ismaël research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Ismaël Lô”?
  2. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Ismaël Lô” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.