"The husband-and-wife duo have been performing together for nearly 40 years. The band’s story begins at the Bamako Institute for the Young Blind in Mali. That’s where the two met in 1975. Amadou Bagayoko was blinded by cataracts as a teenager. Mariam Doumbia has been blind since she was 5 when she had the measles. They fell in love, married and began performing around Bamako, the capital of Mali. They became known around Africa as “the blind couple of Mali.”"