The African music icon will be returning to Hong Kong this March to perform songs from her latest album, ‘Mother Nature’, and more
In early December, the French capital’s performing arts complex the Philharmonie de Paris played host to Sarabande Africaine, a concert that brought together two musical legends—Chinese American cellist Yo-Yo Ma and Angélique Kidjo, a Beninese French singersongwriter who has been bringing traditional African music into the international limelight for 40 years. The world was curious about their chemistry and how African and classical music would go with each other.
If what is available to listen to is anything to go by, the result must have been mesmerising. Take Blewu as an example of just how well the two mesh. The ancient dirge for dead soldiers, sung in the West African language Ewe, opens with the mellow sound of the cello; then Kidjo’s powerful, certain yet gentle voice joins in. The warmth of the strings and her soothing vocals interplay and envelop each other, creating a solemn moment of serenity. “It was about the connection of all the ‘musics’ and everything,” Kidjo tells Tatler.
Don't miss: Grammy-winning cellist Yo-Yo Ma on how to avoid cultural appropriation and why he’s unfazed by AI
Such is the charm of the star whose powerful voice and wide range of genres, spanning African pop, French West Indian zouk, Congolese rumba, jazz, gospel and Latin music, combine to produce an uplifting, comforting quality in both her solo songs and collaborations with artists from across the industry, from John Legend and Alicia Keys to Josh Groban and Philip Glass. Her four-decade career has birthed 15 albums (a new one is under way) and won her five Grammys and 14 nominations.
This month, the music legend will return to Hong Kong, seven years after her last visit, to perform as part of the Hong Kong Arts Festival. She will be singing tracks from her last three albums: Remain in Light (2018), which tackles the Afrobeat underpinnings of New York rock band Talking Heads’ work; Celia (2019), a tribute to Cubanborn Black salsa singer Celia Cruz; and Mother Nature (2021), which brings together musicians from Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Mali, Zambia and the US to sing about nature and women’s empowerment.
While the majority of her work is inspired by her African roots and experiences, Kidjo says a lot of the topics she sings about are universal, and that “it’s always very important for me to entertain people and tell shared human stories” when she performs overseas. “We live in a world that is so interconnected that the issues we have in Africa are pretty much [seen] everywhere,” she says.
Take Mother Nature, which she wrote during the pandemic, as an example. At first, she meant for the album to be a conversation about what is important for African youth. “As I was [locked down], I thought about how we could engage the young generation of African artists in the topic of climate change,” she says. The singer invited them to write to her; some of them even sent her songs and picked the subjects they felt Kidjo should sing about. But she soon realised that it had potential to create far wider impact. “Climate change for them is not only about Mother Nature but also sustainability and social justice. We don’t see the interconnectivity, but the pandemic has shown us that even though we live in different parts of the Earth, nature doesn’t discriminate. We were all at lockdown at one point. We all breathe the same air.”