Koné

Koné is a handpan artist from Leuven, Belgium. His path into music began early, when he started playing a ceramic darbuka his parents brought back from Tunisia at the age of six. For many years, Koné was guided by the Belgian percussionist Johan De Baedts, who introduced him to rhythms, instruments, and musical traditions from across the globe. This early exposure shaped his approach to music and planted the seed for a deeper exploration of sound.

After seeing a video of a magical-sounding metal “turtle” at the age of sixteen, he couldn’t get the handpan out of his head: practicing rhythms on chairs at school and wherever he could. A few years later, after acquiring a first specimen, his focus gradually shifted towards this new and still largely undiscovered instrument. Rather than limiting it to a single genre, Koné explores how the handpan can move through jazz, classical music, electronic textures, and improvisation. Collaboration plays a central role in his research: working with musicians from different backgrounds allows him to push the boundaries of what the instrument can do and to share new musical possibilities with wider audiences.

Koné’s work has been recognised on major Belgian stages. He was selected by Studio Brussel to present his handpan music at Pukkelpop 2024, where he shared the stage with artists such as Eefje de Visser. Shortly after, he was invited by Radio 2 to open the Sportpaleis for Clouseau’s 40th anniversary shows with Bordoo and Lawrence. Alongside his solo work, he performs with different artists (TROY, Tribal Twins, Letterzetter …) and is active in several collaborative projects such as Looping Sessions, an initiative that serves as a platform for Belgian artists to grow by organising live sessions & recordings. Following the music has brought him also to international stages across the UK, Finland, Norway, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Italy, the Canary Islands, Denmark, and beyond.
Out of his love for music, nature, and travel, Koné Motion was born. This project brings together his handpan performance with an ongoing exploration of the relationship between sound and the natural world. Within Koné Motion, Koné works with bio-sonification, using plants as musical collaborators: translating natural processes into sound and integrating them into his compositions.

Living and travelling in his van, his vision is shaped by landscapes, places, and the people he meets along the way. At its core, Koné Motion is about connection: between music and nature, tradition and experiment, and between people through sound.