This month we had been proud to launch our EQUAL program in Ukraine, with singer-songwriter Jamala, our EQUAL Global Ambassador for March, serving to kick off this system.
Spotify’s EQUAL Global Music Program began in 2021 and goals to fight gender disparity within the music business by amplifying and celebrating the work of ladies creators all over the world. Jamala now graces the covers of our EQUAL Global playlist and the newly created EQUAL Україна playlist, which each lead together with her track “Take Me To A Place.”
This isn’t the primary time Jamala and her artistry have been entrance and middle. The Ukrainian artist’s quite a few accomplishments embody the 2022 U.S. Atlantic Council Award for Distinguished Artistic Leadership and the title of People’s Artist of Ukraine. The star was additionally topped the winner of the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest for her single “1944,” a deeply private track impressed by her great-grandmother, who misplaced a baby in the course of the deportation of the Crimean Tatars.
Jamala started her musical profession at a younger age, having graduated from the Ukrainian National Tchaikovsky Academy of Music with a serious in opera singing. While she initially deliberate to be a classical musician, her 2009 win on the New Wave competitors for younger singers of pop music set her on a brand new path. Jamala’s love for experimentation in her sound shines by means of in her seven studio albums. From her assorted use of soul and jazz to electronica and pop, the artist proves she’s a power to be reckoned with and that her music can’t be confined to only one style.
Jamala typically performs in charity occasions, live shows, and tv reveals to boost funds for Ukrainian refugees and kids, and for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. This summer season she’ll be performing reside within the United States and Canada for the primary time.
“All my life I had to fight for my rights—the right to be myself, the right to create. And now, like thousands of courageous Ukrainian women, I am fighting for the right to live in my own home,” Jamala instructed For the Record. “Today we inspire each other to be role models of endurance and resilience. That’s why I would like to share the honor of being an EQUAL Ambassador with every Ukrainian woman out there, who, despite rocket attacks and explosions, is fearlessly fighting for the freedom to live in a free country where every Ukrainian woman’s voice is heard on an equal basis.”
For the Record caught up with Jamala to ask her a number of questions.
The artists who’ve most impressed me are…
Stevie Wonder, Beyoncé, and Billie Eilish.
One piece of recommendation I’d give different ladies artists is…
Never surrender.
One notable second in my profession thus far is…
Performing with Hozier and Brandi Carlile on the Kennedy Center Honors tribute to U2 again in December.
My inventive course of…
Has a sequence. The lyrics encourage the sound.
I’d wish to see…
More gender equality within the music business and extra job alternatives for ladies at C-suite–degree positions. Let’s make the business extra various.
A couple of up-and-coming ladies artists I’m excited to observe are…
Sudan Archives, Audrey Nuna, and, with little doubt, the Ukrainian Go_A.
My woman energy anthem is…
“Strange Fruit” by Billie Holiday.
Listen to Jamala and extra inspiring ladies artists on the EQUAL Global playlist.