This year the Grammy awards added a new category: Best African Music Performance, and happy to say that two iconic young African women made the cut: Ayra Starr from Nigeria and Tyla from South Africa.
Let’s dig into these lady icons. Ayra Starr is the youngest African female artiste to surpass 100 million views in a single video on YouTube. That single video is her music video, Rush. She is also the first to do so within 5 months. She’s 21 and she’s a singer and songwriter.
As at this year, Tyla’s single, “Water”, is the first song by a South African soloist to enter the US Billboard Hot 100 in 55 years. The song entered the top ten in sixteen countries including the UK and the US.
Why I Can’t Keep Calm
On weekends I like to let my hair down and just relax with entertainment; music having always been my favourite form. But this weekend my mind couldn’t resist the urge to analyse the successful Ayla Starr and Tyla Grammy nominations and what brought them these significant firsts.
I can’t keep calm because both women are young, African, creative, and successful in a field they love. If they keep this up, its early retirement here they come.
I mean, how many African female vocals can boast of a grammy nomination by age 22? Ayra Starr and Tyla.
Also, I can’t keep calm because Monday is upon us! Time to dig into what makes business successful and balances our work-life. These ladies just fired up my Monday goals.
My top and first pick of the two divas? Ayra Starr. And that’s not just because Rush is a great Monday morning motivational beat. It’s mostly because the song coaches you through the keys to business and personal success. Here are a few ways how.
Originality
There is nothing more original than native, organic content that is unique to your “tribe”. Rush applies beats that adapt Afro to pop music, localising it to a broader audience and bringing it closer to a global recognition like a Grammy Award. It enhances the Afro beats with the originality of Nigerian Pidgin English.
Such creativity comes from honing a skill you love and persisting with it. So, Rush begins with two key words to fire my Monday attitude: Sabi Girl, Nigerian Pidgin for intelligent girl.
I am a sabi girl and all supermoms are. In business, we know our onions. Practice business intelligence and as soon as you get a hang on it, work hard at drilling your knowledge into skill.
Resilience
Even on days when you’re hurt or don’t have the energy, show up as best you can. “You must hustle if you wan chop”, says Starr. Hustling gives the sense of fighting back through persistent hard work. If you’re going to succeed, or chop, you must hustle.
Recognise your competition, learn from your mistakes and their strengths but don’t be intimidated by it. Bagging a grammy nomination followed breaking through several layers of criticism, setback and competition.
Through it all, spare no time for “hate and bad energy”.
Focus
“Steady on my grind, no wan hear what anyone tell me”, for me just places the dart on the centre spot where I want it to be. Focus on achieving your goals and let your day of achievement be your motivation.
You may keep aspiring to be better, so that achievement is not an endgame. But focus on consistently reaching short term goals and ignore detractors.
Self-Care
Starr’s tone and body language are sensual enough for you to feel the attention and care she gifts herself, but the whole point of the song is that her tap “dey rush”.
The idea that her source abundantly flows with energy, creativity, wealth and every positive thing she’s working to achieve underscores the constant attention to self-care and spirituality.
The whole theme of Rush centres around the positive effects of self-care.
But in Water, Tyla digs into a special aspect of self-care that women often fail to address or sacrifice too easily: satisfying sex.
Saying what we want in sex and freely expressing to our partner how to achieve it, is often masked in shyness or shame.
Why Tyla is Original
You can’t mistake the South African accent in the opening phone call. But the appeal of Water is not in the Africanness of Tyla’s accent or her English is very universal.
The craftiness of this song in my view is in the suspense it builds of challenging a partner to satisfy his woman, if she gives him her time. She teases her man by building a desire in him, yet subtly warns him to make her time count.
Its an elevated form of feminine self-worth that describes the sexual self-care that should characterise every relationship: A woman emancipated enough to require sexual satisfaction and a man who feels desired enough for his woman to lay the groundwork for it.
I think that’s why everyone resonates with this song. This is how we all want to be encountered in our time of sexual need, and Tyla, gives a voice to women who can’t find the words.
Persuasion
This arguably feminine art is carefully crafted in Water. The request is emphatic and repetitive, almost hypnotic. The language is vivid, yet pure. No shocking words, all soft yet no ambiguities, we all know what the lady wants.
Combine all of subtleties and almost every partner would comply.
For me the … is in the list of specific instructions defining the standard of satisfaction. This is not some blind seductress but a woman with a specific mission. It sort of goes back to making her self-care time count.
It has to be said, not every man understands that sex for a woman is part of her self-care routine, and it needs to be overall satisfying.
Don’t Wait, Sometimes, be a Go Getter
Always prioritise self-care. Sometimes, like Water implies, be the first to initiate sex. Timing is important and your chosen partner is everything, so do take your time and make sure your partner is worth your most intimate moment of self-care and respects it.
If you’re practicing abstinence, find ways to refocus your sexual energies by engaging in exercise and activities that produce similar or equivalent emotional and enzymatic reactions.
After all said, only one artiste takes home the grammy tonight. Both females are winners by my standards. Resiliently working hard, sharpening their skills to soar to the highest recognition for any singer, and prioritising self-care above any competition or distraction there may be.
And The Grammy Goes to…
Water. Sunday night, all African supermoms were rooting for an Ayra Starr and Tyla Grammy Award and they got one. Tyla took home the award, overwhelmed with grateful emotion.
Congratulations, Tyla, and thanks to both ladies for representing.
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