Malian blues singer and guitarist Ali Farka Toure, one of Africa's best loved musicians, died in his sleep at home on Tuesday after a long fight with bone cancer. He was in his late 60s.
Dubbed "the African John Lee Hooker", the Grammy-winning bluesman was among West Africa's most internationally successful artists, winning acclaim around the world for his 1994 album Talking Timbuktu, recorded with Texan guitarist Ry Cooder.
"Ali was for Mali, for Africa and for the rest of the world a very great musician. A musician who leaves behind him a fabulous heritage," said Culture Minister Cheick Oumar Sissoko.
"We are receiving phone calls and emails from around the world today," he said on Malian state radio.
Farka Toure, who was born in 1939 but did not know his exact date of birth, won a second Grammy last month for In the Heart of the Moon, recorded with his countryman Toumani Diabate and voted best traditional world music album.
He had just finished work on a new solo album when he died.
"An exceptional guitarist, he transposed the traditional music of his native north Mali and single-handedly brought the style known as desert blues to an international audience," World Circuit, the label that produces his music, said in a statement.
Radio stations interrupted their programmes to broadcast his hypnotic music. Some played homages from listeners and fellow musicians around the impoverished West African nation, which stretches across the southern edge of the Sahara desert.
Though he achieved international renown later in his career, Farka Toure's life and music remained deeply rooted in the traditions of his home village, Niafunke, which lies in barren savannah near the fabled Saharan trading town of Timbuktu.
He retreated from music to concentrate on his rice farm in 1990. When his producer convinced him to record again, an impromptu studio running on generators had to be set up in the village so he could tend his fields at the same time.
He was appointed mayor of Niafunke, where he will be buried, in 2004 in recognition of his efforts to improve the agricultural and social situation of those living in the region.
"He's one of the great, great, great musicians. Nobody does what Ali does. He is one of a kind: he is the lion of the desert," kora player Toumani Diabate wrote in the liner notes to "In the Heart of the Moon".
Farka Toure, who took up the guitar at the age of 10, toured often in North America and Europe, adapting influences from jazz, blues and the traditional songs of West Africa's Songhai, Mande and Tuareg cultures.
"All this music inspired Ali Farka, and he enriched all these traditions," Culture Minister Sissoko said.