{"id":337439,"date":"2026-03-13T15:54:17","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T15:54:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/337439\/"},"modified":"2026-03-13T15:54:17","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T15:54:17","slug":"nigerian-singer-ckay-seeks-to-redefine-how-people-view-african-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/337439\/","title":{"rendered":"Nigerian singer CKay seeks to redefine how people view African music"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lagos, Nigeria
\n \u00a0\u2014\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n Fans of Nigerian artist CKay received a welcome gift in late January: the singer released his latest song, \u201cBadminton.\u201d It\u2019s a high-energy, melodic track with an infectious sound. The song, which has been gaining traction online, continues his signature Emo-Afrobeats style, of which CKay is widely seen as the pioneer.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cUsing emotional chords, minor scales a lot, very warm ambient synthesizers and instruments like guitars \u2014 electric or acoustic \u2014 keyboards, all these things together with very poetic, deep and emotional lyrics, gives you Emo-Afrobeats,\u201d he tells CNN\u2019s Larry Madowo in an interview in Lagos, Nigeria.\n <\/p>\n

\n Bringing a different sound to Afrobeats isn\u2019t the only thing the Nigerian star is doing. He, like many of his peers, would like to move beyond the \u201cAfrobeats\u201d label. \u201cAfrobeats is a convenient term. I won\u2019t say I love the term\u2026 I think over time I started to see the effects of that overgeneralization,\u201d he says.\n <\/p>\n

\n Artists argue that the term is limiting. Burna Boy, who blends Afrobeats, reggae, dancehall, pop and hip-hop, says he would like his music to be classified as \u201cAfrofusion.\u201d Wizkid, who blends his music with R&B and Afropop, has also voiced his frustration.\n <\/p>\n

\n CKay equates the broad Afrobeats label to calling music from the West simply \u201cWestern music.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s kind of like the way you can\u2019t just call Western music White music or American beats or European beats, you know? There\u2019s rock, there\u2019s jazz, there\u2019s dancehall, there\u2019s all kinds of stuff, all kinds of sounds. So that\u2019s the same way I feel about African music,\u201d he says.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cI feel Africa has over 50 countries, more than 50 cultures,\u201d he adds. \u201cNigeria alone has over 36 ethnic groups with different languages, food, music, rhythm. With the music, they also have their own instruments \u2026 So, coming to a whole continent and just calling everything Afrobeats, you know, if you think about that, it\u2019s not the most apt.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\"ckay<\/p>\n

How carving his own path helped Emo-Afrobeats star CKay shatter global records\n <\/p>\n

\"ckay<\/p>\n

How carving his own path helped Emo-Afrobeats star CKay shatter global records<\/p>\n

23:05 <\/p>\n

\n By speaking out and continuing to release genre-blending music, CKay hopes to help people better appreciate the diversity of African music. \u201cI think for the Western world \u2026 it\u2019s a start, to help them understand African music and obviously, when people learn more, they\u2019ll probably learn about the different subgenres,\u201d he says.\n <\/p>\n

\n As he continues to showcase those subgenres, the songwriter and producer hopes to repeat past success. In 2021, during the Covid-19 pandemic, his now-megahit \u201cLove Nwantiti\u201d became a global phenomenon after fans started making videos to the 2019 song\u2019s instrumental chorus. It made him the first artist to top the inaugural Billboard Afrobeats Songs chart, in April 2022.\n <\/p>\n

\"CKay<\/p>\n

\n The love ballad spent over 52 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 list, peaking at No. 3. That success was topped when the song was streamed more than 1 billion times on Spotify in December 2025, making CKay the first Nigerian solo artist to reach that milestone. \u201cI knew it would be successful, but I just didn\u2019t know it would be that successful,\u201d he said. \u201cI would say the scale of the success was something that \u2026 came as a very pleasant surprise.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n At just 30 years old, CKay has already made his mark and he has no plans to slow down. \u201cI think consistency and being committed to the journey is key, and I like to just accept and embrace my responsibility as a trailblazer. I try to create trends, not follow them. I try to create sounds, not copy them. I try to build on the legacy and history of what our ancestors made and take it to the next level,\u201d he says.\n <\/p>\n

\n And as he continues down that path, the trendsetter says he wants to be remembered as someone who \u201cinnovated the sound, advanced the culture, and made the world a better place than I met it.\u201d By all indications, he is well on his way.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lagos, Nigeria \u00a0\u2014\u00a0 Fans of Nigerian artist CKay received a welcome gift in late January: the singer released…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":337440,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[458,146,85,46],"class_list":["post-337439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-il","tag-israel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=337439"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337439\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/337440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=337439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=337439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=337439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}