Habib Koite and his band Bamada play at Lupo’s in Providence on Wednesday.

DIRK LEUNIS

The Malian singer, songwriter and guitarist Habib Koite took six years between records, but he wasn’t sitting idle — quite the opposite.

“Some different music projects, and some with my own band,” says Koite, describing his activities during the time between 2001’s Baro and last year’s Afriki.

Most notably, he worked on the double-disc Desert Blues project, a compendium of music from Mali featuring Koite and his band, Bamada; the female vocal group Tartit; and Afel Bocoum. The record turned into a tour, which eventually turned into a concert film of the same name.

“I had to organize three bands together and make it just like one band,” Koite remembers. “… No time to sit tranquilo and think of new songs and practice.”

Afriki is a tour de force of Malian and West African music, with Koite melding contemporary singer-songwriter pop with African traditional music.

Some of the highlights include the scratchy, distorted, blues-tinged sokou (a traditional violin-like instrument), played by the late Hassy Sarre, on “Barra,” and the antelope horns, that sound a bit like a children’s choir, on “Nta Dima.” Contrast those with the sleek, modern “Massake,” where lots of speedy hand percussion parts combine for a dizzying effect reminiscent of a sequencer.

Through it all, the common denominator is Koite’s raspy voice and acoustic guitar, as he sings in his native Bambara on a variety of wide-ranging subjects: the beauty of a country girl as a metaphor for a warning against overdevelopment (“Namania”), the importance of family (“N’tesse”), the need for Africans to take over their own development (“Africa” and “Barra”), restrictive marriage traditions (“Nta Dima”) and more. And it closes with Koite’s first recorded solo-guitar instrumental, “Titati,” forming a lovely coda to the record.

Koite, from Bamako, in the west of Mali, says that he’s only one of many ambassadors for Malian music, in part because there are so many kinds of Malian music.

“We are a lot of people,” Koite says, listing six ethnicities in the country, and says “It’s why we really have a lot of different music. Different rhythms, different scales, different soul. … You can see how the view changes and the music changes.” The music and the legends and stories behind it are kept alive and combined by the griot — a traditional storyteller. Koite’s mother was a griot, and the void left by her sudden death while Koite was on the road is documented on “N’ba.”

Koite’s Providence concert Wednesday is a benefit for the Providence-based GAIA (Global Alliance to Immunize against AIDS) Vaccine Foundation, founded and run by Brown professor Annie de Groot. “She’s tried to make something in Mali,” Koite says, “but it’s not easy. You want to help people, but some people don’t understand you are here for help. That’s the problem sometimes in Africa. People come and want to help others and it’s like a closed door. You have to be really strong to open those doors and go do your project.”

The foundation’s most visible projects are the Hope Center Clinic in Koite’s Bamako, and a program for HIV-positive mothers to help deliver healthy children.

According to the GAIA Web site, the incidence of HIV in the adult population of Mali is 1.9 per cent — 170,000 to 400,000 people are living with the disease. Koite, however, says things are getting better; citing the World Health Organization, he says “They say Mali is an example in Africa to reduce AIDS infection.”

The song “Africa,” on the new record, touches on the problems, including “how this help is used by some African people to put in their pocket, and the help doesn’t go to the people who need it.”

And Koite takes this and many other messages on tour with him around the world, and the music — the sunny acoustic guitar, the sinuous rhythms — connects with people, even if they don’t understand the language.

“That is my question,” Koite says. “Because I know I don’t sing in the language of those people. And I answer myself maybe they want to travel. Maybe they want to feel what’s up in Mali. They feel the music and they want to move their own spirit.”

Habib Koite and Bamada play at Lupo’s Heartbreak Hotel, 79 Washington St., Providence, Wednesday night at 7:30. Tickets are $35, $20 for children under 12. Call (401) 331-5876.

For more information on the GAIA Foundation, go to www.gaiavaccine.org.

rmassimo@projo.com