Pierre Akendengué, who was born on 25 April 1943 in Aouta, Gabon, left his homeland at the age of 22 to continue his education in France, where he was also able to receive specialist treatment for his eye problems. Pierre settled in the town of Orléans, where he passed his ‘baccalauréat’ and went on to take a university degree in psychology. (The talented student would not only obtain a degree, he would also complete his PhD in psychology in 1976).

While studying for his degree Pierre would also pursue a musical career. In 1967, at the age of 24, he would enroll at the Petit Conservatoire run by the famous French singer Mireille. Pierre proved to be an exceptionally talented pupil. Indeed the young singer came third in "La fine fleur de la chanson", a well-known French song contest. During his time in Paris Pierre also met a well-known producer and musician, Pierre Barouh, who was to prove instrumental in getting the young singer’s career off the ground. It was Barouh who got Pierre Akendengué into the studio in 1974 to record "Nandipo", the singer’s accomplished début album based on his childhood experiences in Africa.

Akendengué was eager to retain his African links and would often travel back and forth between France and Gabon. However, these trips proved to be extremely expensive and in 1972 Akendengué could no longer afford to return to his homeland. This dealt a serious blow to the singer’s career in Africa, for as soon as he stopped returning to Gabon his records stopped being played on the country’s airwaves.

Meanwhile, Akendengué’s career was beginning to take off in France. Indeed, in 1976 the singer’s second album "Africa Obota" (Africa My Mother), carried off the "Prix de la jeune chanson française" at Midem, the annual record industry fair held in Cannes. This excellent second album featured a number of songs in Myéné, Akendengué’s African mother tongue, as well as several tracks recorded in French.

Pierre Akendengué’s militant lyrics soon earned him a reputation as a protest singer. In fact, the singer’s next two albums did contain numerous tracks about specifically African themes and several songs explicitly calling for African unity, but Akendengué was not happy about being neatly pigeon-holed in this way. The singer felt there was more to his music than radical statements and fought long and hard to change the image which the media had thrust upon him.

In 1978 Akendengué began to move away from lyric-based tracks and develop the instrumental side of his work. Later that year the singer also set up his own recording label, Ntche (Homeland) in order to control his own work and promote young up-and-coming talents from Africa. Sadly, Akendengué did not have a big enough budget to run the label for long and Ntche came to an end in 1982 after the release of just three albums.  

In September 1982 Akendengué signed a new recording deal with CBS and went straight into the studio to begin work on his new album with producer Hugues de Courson and a group of thirty session musicians. Released in April 1983, "Mando" was an extremely rich album entirely recorded in Akendengué’s mother tongue, Myéné. Akendengué’s lyrics were as militant as ever but the political content of his songs was by now more heavily symbolised (as is often the case in African oral tradition). In 1984 Akendengué left the studio to concentrate on his live career, embarking upon an extensive tour which included numerous dates in Belgium, the Netherlands and the French Antilles.

The following year the singer began to grow weary of his career rising to dizzying heights one moment then plummeting to the depths the next. Plagued by serious health problems, Akendengué decided to leave France in 1985 and return to his homeland where he soon settled in Libreville. The singer continued with his music career in Gabon, putting together "Passé Composé", a compilation album of his most important work to date and his most famous songs about the changing face of Africa. In 1989 Akendengué returned to the studio to record a brand new album entitled "Espoir à Soweto" (Hope for Soweto). This strongly political album called for an immediate end to African apartheid.

Shortly after returning to Gabon, Akendengué began to play an active role in his country’s cultural life. The singer began working as a close assistant to Gabon’s Minister of Culture and ended up being one of President Omar Bongo’s most influential advisors on cultural matters.

Akendengué returned to the recording studio in 1991 to work on a new album entitled "Silence". Then, after the release of "Silence", the singer set to work on the most ambitious project of his entire career, working in close collaboration with producer Hugues de Courson. Akendengué’s highly original idea for his next album, "Lambarena", was to fuse sacred chants from the equatorial forest region with classical cantatas composed by Johann Sebastian Bach. Akendengué and de Courson’s innovative musical project involved 250 African singers and a group of 50 French classical musicians - and the resulting album was an absolute masterpiece. Respecting the sacred nature of both the chants and the cantatas, Akendengué proved that these two radically different genres from vastly different cultures could be fused to create a totally new sound.

After this ambitious musical project Akendengué did not return to the studio again until 1996 when he recorded the album "Maladité". This emotional album finds the singer evoking the problems of his homeland and the suffering of the African people. The title - a contraction of the words "malade" (ill) and "alité" (in bed) - says it all really.

Throughout his career Akendengué has always enjoyed working with other artists and after the release of "Maladité" he set off on a month-long tour of Africa with the Senegalese singer Ismaël Lô. (In fact, the pair had already teamed up together in December 95 when they performed at the Africolor festival in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis).

1997 proved to be an extremely successful year for Pierre Akendengué. On 8 February the singer was finally honoured in his homeland, receiving the "Prix d'excellence" at the Africa Music awards in Libreville. Akendengué then went on to follow his triumph at the music awards with an excellent new album entitled "Carrefour Rio".

In the course of his 30-year career Pierre Akendengué has proved himself to be one of Africa’s most talented singer/songwriters. He has also shown himself to be a man who cares passionately about his homeland. Indeed, the entire body of Akendegué’s work is filled with concern for the African people and a deep commitment to African unity.

At the end of 2001, Pierre Akendengué was back in the music spotlight with the release of his album "Obakadences". The album found Akendengué as passionate about the African continent as always. The lyrics said its hopes and contradictions. Such tracks as "Confidentiel ô Très Haut" revived Akendengué’s talent for storytelling, while others like "Benibeni" and "Afrika Idod Iningo" focused on harmonies and rhythms. Travelling more in Africa than in Europe. Akendengué embarked on a tour of French cultural centres at the end of March 2002, travelling up and down seven African countries including his own homeland.

Although Pierre Akendengué continues to work as a cultural advisor to the government, his artistic career remains very alive. Recording conditions are relatively difficult in Gabon, and it took a while before his next album could be released. "Ekunda-Sah!" came out in France in March 2005. Still a strong militant, Akendengué explores on this album humanist themes in songs such as "La pauvreté" (poverty) or "la Colombe" (the dove). The first single from the album is "Embarras".

Pierre Akendengué performs at the Bataclan in Paris on 4 April.

Soon afterwards, Akendengué set to work on a new album with a hard-hitting theme: the history of slavery. One of the enduring symbols of the slave trade is the isle of Gorée (just off the coast of Senegal) and the musician chose "Gorée" as the title of his new album, released in April 2006.

In 1997, Akendengué had actually visited Gorée and his trip had proved to be an intensely emotional experience. The musician's experiences on the island led to him writing "La chanson de Gorée", which would later serve as a basis for his album about the slave trade. Akendengué claimed he had been motivated to make "Gorée" as a way of keeping the troubled history of slavery at the forefront of people's minds and encouraging debate. His album also raised other topical issues on songs such as "De la forêt" which evokes the plight of Pygmies in Gabon, currently being evicted from their rainforest home. Akendengué appears to be happy with his new role of spokesperson, using his music to denounce human suffering and injustice across Africa.

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A fervent believer in Pan-Africanism, Pierre Akendengué is undoubtedly a humanist singer-song-writer celebrated by worldwide audiences.

May 2006