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Jillian Carpio

When Arooj Aftab was announced as a nominee for best new artist at the 64th Grammy Awards, it marked the first time that a Pakistani woman was recognised by the recording academy, making history for Pakistan and South Asia.
The 36-year-old genre-blending vocalist is also the first Pakistani to be nominated in the best new artist category. Musician Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan was nominated in 1996 for best traditional folk album and best world music album.
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While her name may not be familiar to many yet, she is actually an established singer in her home country, with a music career dating back to 2014 and three albums to her name.
Here are a few things you should know about her.
Music has been a large part of her life since she was young

Aftab comes from a family of music-lovers, and many of her earliest memories involve music: her family and friends would host evenings where they talked about their love of music and played songs together. As a result, she felt a deep connection to the art form.
“I think I felt very connected to it from a very early age – the desire to kind of integrate it into my life was becoming stronger and stronger, and I think I do remember being in school and listening to music and using it almost like a friend,” Aftab told Our Culture magazine.
She went viral for a cover of Hallelujah that she sang as a teenager

Due to her passion for music, Aftab decided that she wanted to pursue a degree in it. However, as a young teenager in Pakistan, nobody understood her dream.
“My dad was talking about how some people think that they want to do music but they actually just really like music,” she told Pitchfork.
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But she decided to give it a shot anyway, and recorded a jazzy cover of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah. Her song went viral in her native Lahore, and it empowered her to apply to the Berklee College of Music in Boston.
She has a degree from Berklee College of Music

Aftab was eventually accepted to Berklee College of Music and moved to Boston. “I had always dreamed of going to Berklee, but it wasn’t until I won a scholarship and began studying music online that my family took notice of my abilities and agreed to let me study abroad,” she said in a student profile on the university’s website.
In an interview with NPR’s Weekly Edition Sunday, Aftab said the following: “I built more roots there and I inherited, you know, samba and jazz and Afro-Cuban … but I think, most dominantly, what fused was what I studied, which is jazz.”
She prefers to sing in Urdu

Aftab has English songs in her discography, but prefers to sing in her native Urdu. She considers the two to be different, and believes that she is able to take more risks with her music when she sings in Urdu.
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When asked whether it feels different singing in Urdu versus English, Aftab told Pitchfork, “Yeah, it lives in a different place in your mouth, in your entire body. Everything changes a little bit – the intonation and inflection, the accent, the diction … I’ve developed a vocal agility and created my own sound in Urdu.”
Former US president Barack Obama is a fan of her work

Aftab’s sound has gained her a fair share of followers from across the world – including former US president Barack Obama. In July 2021, Obama listed her song Mohabbat as one of the tracks in his 2021 summer playlist, which he posted on his Instagram account. The song is a single off her latest album “Vulture Prince”, released this year, and is Aftab’s take on a ghazal, a poem in song form that finds beauty in longing.
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Music

Meet Arooj Aftab, Pakistan’s first female Grammy nominee – her song Mohabbat made it to Barack Obama’s 2021 Summer Playlist on Instagram, and her new album ‘Vulture Prince’ is making waves

Arooj Aftab is Pakistan’s first female Grammy nominee whose music blends neo-Sufi and jazz genres. Photo: @hyfn/Instagram

Music was a core part of Grammy nominee Arooj Aftab’s childhood. Photo: @aroojaftabmusic/Instagram

Arooj Aftab is Pakistan’s first-ever female Grammy nominee. Photo: @aroojaftabmusic/Instagram

Arooj Aftab moved to Boston for university. Photo: @aroojaftabmusic/Instagram

Pakistan’s first female Grammy nominee Arooj Aftab created her own sound in Urdu. Photo: @aroojaftabmusic/Instagram

Former US president Barack Obama is a fan of Arooj Aftab’s music. Photo: @barackobama/Instagram

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The singer is also the first Pakistani to be nominated for best new artist; Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan was previously nominated for best world music album
Aftab, who blends minimalist, jazz and neo-Sufi genres, has three albums under her belt and her cover of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah went viral when she was a teen


The history-making singer’s jazz-inspired melody Mohabbat even made it to former US president Barack Obama’s 2021 summer playlist on Instagram
