`Little by little,' they're big For Amadou & Mariam, the husband-and-wife Afropop duo, the world and their world beat are suddenly not so small. Amadou & Mariam: Suddenly a big beat

As a French-speaking native of Mali, in West Africa, Amadou Bagayoko was as disappointed as any francophone soccer fan over France's loss to Italy in Sunday's World Cup final.

"Of course, I watched the game like everybody else," said Bagayoko, the guitar-playing half of the husband-and-wife Afropop duo Amadou & Mariam, who will make their Philadelphia debut tonight at the Kimmel Center. "They lost, but they still made it [to the final]. That's the way it is."

Unlike other French futbol fans, Bagayoko and his wife had a sweet dose of consolation to go with their frustration over Zinedine Zidane's head-butting antics. The duo, known as "the Blind Couple From Mali," collaborated on the official FIFA World Cup anthem, "Celebrate the Day," with Herbert Gronemeyer, the biggest-selling pop act in Germany.

The transformation of Amadou & Mariam (last name: Doumbia) from obscure world- music act to international sensation was instigated by Dimanche  Bamako, their ebullient, adventurous album produced by world-beat guru Manu Chao and released in the States last year.

"We've been making music a long time," the guitarist, 51, said by phone through an interpreter Monday, while stopping on tour in Canada. "For us, it came little by little."

Dimanche - which was praised in The Inquirer as "effortlessly modern and full of natural joie de vivre" - was the critics' favorite world-music album of 2005, a party record for the NPR crowd if there ever was one. It mixes sly, inventive production with an organic mixture of traditional Malian music with Cuban son and reggae influences, and combines an open-eared multicultural aesthetic with an appetite for irresistible hooks.

Selling more than a half-million copies in France and earning a Grammy nomination, Dimanche has transformed the careers of the duo. The couple, who met at the Institute for Young Blind People in Mali in the 1970s, wear traditional African robes on stage along with tres chic sunglasses by French designer Alain Mikli, with whom they have a sponsorship deal.

In 2003, when they first met Chao, the duo were playing outside London concert halls for tips. Now they're headlining those halls, and on this American tour they've had high-profile gigs at the Coachella and Bonnaroo festivals.

Though Amadou & Mariam's success has been dramatic, it has been a long time coming.