Alseny Sylla was born in Conakry, Guinea in 1964. He first began studying drums at the age of 16 playing with the Federation Company, Basicola, where he studied djun djuns, the large bass drums that carry Guinean rhythms. With the demise of the countries president in 1981 the company disbanded and Monsieur Sylla was asked to join the private dance and drum ensemble, Etoile du Cdum, from 1981 to 1987 which toured Mali, Burkina Faso, Togo, Ghana and Ivory Coast.

In 1987 Monsieur Sylla moved from Guinea to Abidjan, Ivory Coast where he worked for the next eleven years with the companies C’dyao and Koteba. Koteba was the first national company comprised of many different African ethnic groups from different countries that combined theater, music, dance and ancestral traditions and with whom he first toured the United States in 1992. This group also toured France, Amsterdam, Germany, Australia, Italy, Central and Western Africa.

In 1999 Monsieur Sylla left Africa for New York and began performing with two West African Drum and Dance Ensembles; Foliba, with Percussion of Guinea’s Mohamed Camara, and Acquaba, a group led by a dancer from the Ivory Coast. During this time Alseny also taught drum classes and accompanied local dance classes as well as dance classes in New York City. He teaches Djun djun workshops at Lisangua Ya Bato, a drum and dance camp in upstate New York that is known throughout the U.S.A. as having the best African instructors for an intensive 10 day long camp. Drummers and

dancers from all over the U.S. work their summer vacations around this camp. Alseny also performed for traditional African weddings and various benefits in New York City and the surrounding tri-state area.

Following two trips to Austin, Texas for workshops arranged specifically for him, Mr. Sylla permanently relocated to Austin in 2000 at the invitation of the local West African dance teacher, Suzannah Kincannon. He is currently teaching classes in djembe and djun djun and accompanying West African dance classes as the soloist at Tapestry Dance Studio, Atomic Dance Factory, and the Arabic Bazaar. He has also accompanied West African dance classes at the University of Texas at Austin, Kenny Doram School for the Performing Arts and Zilker Elementary School. Monsieur Sylla has been a major draw for students at the local Afrikan Village Drum and Dance Camp in Dripping Springs in which teachers now residing in New York, also from Guinea, travel to Austin to teach at the request of Monsieur Sylla, immensely forwarding the learning of his students.

Monsieur Sylla is co-founder and Director of Lannaya Drum and Dance Ensemble. Lannaya, which translates as “CONFIDENCE” in his native language, Su Su, is an intensely energetic ensemble comprised of dynamic local drummers and dancers who have been studying and dancing to his highly emotional rhythms of traditional Guinea and Ivory Coast for these past two years in Austin.