Four Decades Later, Angélique Kidjo is Still Raising the Bar

Angélique Kidjo’s influence on the African music scene is immeasurable.

Her exceptional artistry and astute showmanship have resulted in a career that stands alongside the greats of this century — and yet, Kidjo isn’t stopping.

OkayAfrica recently met the Beninese French icon at Carnegie Hall in New York City, where we had a conversation that ranged across her glittering career. She traced the roots of her musical path, which “started with [her] album Pretty, in 1981,” says Kidjo. “I had to take my student loan as a loan to come and record in Paris.”

Always the trailblazer, the zebra-designed jumpsuit Kidjo wore on the cover of Logozowas deemed too “modern” for an African artist. The backstory is even more ridiculously ignorant. “The stylist they called for us was like, ‘You don’t need stylists, don’t you guys walk naked in your countries?’ So I went out and got that jumpsuit.”

Kidjo infused electronic touches into her style, and even though the curators and executives couldn’t understand it for a while, her trust in her art paid off. The Beninese singer looks reflective when she considers the gains of her perseverance.

“This young generation, they all grew up with my music. They all sample my music,” she says. “I’m glad that all the fights I’ve been through, all the misunderstandings, all the cliches of what an African person should sound like and look like — it was not for nothing, because it gives wings to this new generation to start their career unapologetically.”

Discussing the freedom of creativity in the modern age, where an artist can choose to sign to a record label or not, Kidjo sees a distinction from her own period when she had to sign to a label to have a career. With this freedom comes the need for even more discipline. “This new generation has to be consistent, professional, perfectionist. They have to be on time, because there are gonna be new artists coming every day!”

In her own artistry, Kidjo has demonstrated the need to be “spotless,” as she told us in an earlier interview. She didn’t always have vocal training, rather charting her early career through the sensuous vibrations of her voice. When she took on a trainer, it was none other than the legendary William Riley, who taught her “to extend [her] range with exercises,” she says. “The voice is like an instrument. At the same time, it is a fragile instrument.”

Kidjo also contributes to the ever-turning conversation about African genres and their place in international award shows. No other African person dead or alive has more Grammys than her, so it was only right she spoke about the platform.

“What I like about the Recording Academy is that they listen,” she said. “They are not perfect, but if you want change, you’re going to have that conversation with them. So, let’s get to work. If it’s Afrobeats, whatever you’re gonna call it, you call it. [If] you don’t like it, let’s come up with something. They don’t pretend to know everything. Let’s have a conversation. Let’s sit and talk. What do we want? How do we make everybody represented? How do we have gender equality?”

Kidjo’s ideologies have always found a way into her art, and her showcases of powerful women, both African and Black, have made her an immovable force in this century’s discourse of gender, especially in relation to contemporary music.

As an exclusive, she tells us that her next album will, “celebrate the spirit of [her] mother,” she says.