If my newly opened platform stands for true visibility and true diversity of female* musicians world wide, I believe I have to start showing those values by writing articles myself and share with you all what I find during my research. I myself had to realise how narrow my knowledge is about international female* musicians. I guess in a way I started this platform for myself a little too, to grow my knowledge and throw boundaries overboard and get in contact with diversity and beauty of music worldwide. Eventually I would love to have regular guest authors to write for Her*MusicWorld so they can share their knowledge and passion with you all and help us all to get to know more than what surrounds us immediately! Now my goal is to go beyond the standard of showing “just” singers, which is quite a mission I came to realise. So far it ain’t so easy to get to find current female instrumentalists beyond singers and it seems I have to really dig. BUT I don’t want to jinx it, I have found a few that I am going to share with you all in the next weeks and hopefully other bloggers and journalists will eventually too.
This being said, let’s start with the first woman that I encountered on my research looking for African musicians*. One Website that I found to be really helpful is www.musicinafrica.net especially their “Knowledge” Section. I randomly picked the article about Women in Northern Nigerian music which I really recommend to read. When I read about the religious and political background about Nigeria and the position of Women in Nigeria I was really surprised to find a female Rapper at the end of the Article. I was intrigued and started to check out her music.
Meet, so to speak, Hadiza Yau in a short Video Report and Interview about her on BBC https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-africa-41901654.
Something that made me think was the title of the BBC Interview “Meet the Nigerian rapper who loves dressing modestly” and the following excerpt of Ibrahim Malumfashi article about Women in Northern Nigerian Music.
Despite these successes, female musicians still do not regularly get the attention of event organisers and other influencers within the entertainment industry. In their quest to find spaces and platforms to develop their craft, women in Northern Nigeria are often met with discrimination.
Does she LOVE dressing modestly? What do you think?
Either way, seeing and hearing her rap in a Mix of Hausa and Englisch impressed me and I hope she eventually got to meet or will meet her idol Nicki Minaj, showing again how important it is to have role models or idols to have the power to grow beyond yourself!