Bailly Sylvestre Gallet, the "monument" singer of Ivorian music, was born in Abidjan in 1951. Bailly Sylvestre Gallet, who would become known as " The Man with the Golden Voice", began his singing career at school, drawing heavily on the Anglo-Saxon soul, funk and pop artists of his youth, including Otis Reading, James Brown and The Beatles. In 1961, he won first prize in a radio contest. He went on to sing in a number of bands and toured the world as lead vocalist with New System Pop. In 1979, he released his first solo single, "Taxi Sougnon", a seminal song in the history of Ivorian chanson, a slow song that toured Africa and reached number 1 in the hits parades. He followed this up with his first album, A Nouhoume, whose eponymous track firmly established "le rossignol" as an African star. Album after album followed: Gnian Gnian (1980), Anou Me (1983), Bli Na Lo (1986), and Gnian Maman in 1992, which went gold and opened the doors of the Olympia in Paris. The artist has released eighteen albums in the course of his career. In 2022, the artist is still touring, and has celebrated his 50th anniversary in style, surrounded by a symphony orchestra and inviting the new generation of African artists to join him on stage.
