Devastated, Traor once again dropped out of sight. He left for France to make enough money to support his children and disappeared among the Malinese expatriate community in Paris, where he worked as a laborer but continued to play, recording two albums. With his melancholy voice and bluesy guitar playing, he sounds like Robert Johnson performing canonical Khassonke rhythms with traditional instruments such as the kora, balafon, and n'goni. On acoustic guitar, which was introduced to Mali in the early 1900s by sailors, Traor returns African American music to Africa. The West African kora is considered the ancestor of the American blues guitar.
Many musicologists believe the roots of the blues can be directly found in West Africa.
Ali Farka Tour , who won a Grammy in America for his record with Ry Cooder, has praised Boubacar Traor . Kar Kar knows Ali Farka Tour as a fellow musician respectful enough to carry an older man's guitar for him after a local gig. Once that exotic travel company puts you on their map or adds you to one of their tours of the hitherto unspoiled, all kinds of people show up, ready or not. Something is about to happen to him. Hopefully it's what friends want for him and close to whatever Kar Kar imagined when he first agreed to leave Mali again.