In a Dubai recording studio, hijab-clad Ghaliaa Chaker tunes her guitar and belts out unique songs as she builds a profession that’s turning heads for extra than simply her music.
The 26-year-old Syrian, who was raised within the United Arab Emirates, has change into a social media sensation, with 437,000 followers on Instagram and hundreds of thousands of views on her YouTube channel.
She affords not solely a novel sound but additionally an uncommon look in a area the place artists who put on the hijab, the top overlaying attribute of Muslim girls, are few and much between.
“I hope that I’ve paved the best way for different” hijabi singers, Chaker advised AFP on the studio.
“It’s a very lovely factor to know that you’ve… given a push to a woman who has many goals and is unable to realize them as a result of she has by no means seen one other lady do the identical factor.”
Chaker, a eager bike rider who’s a part of an all-hijabi biker squad in Dubai, started composing and writing lyrics on the age of 16.
She drew inspiration from Nedaa Shrara, a veiled Jordanian singer who received “The Voice”, the Arabic model of the favored TV expertise present, in 2015.
Shrara had stirred controversy amongst some Arab followers who weren’t accustomed to seeing a singer carrying the top overlaying.
However for Chaker, who says she usually receives criticism on-line, Shrara was an emblem of “self-confidence”.
After seeing her, “I stated to myself that I can do it too”, Chaker stated.
– ‘Unfavorable feedback’ –
Chaker’s first track, composed in English, was picked up by Dubai radio stations in 2018, marking the beginning of her musical profession.
She now sings principally in Arabic, at a time when the regional music scene is witnessing the rise of younger abilities with progressive sounds.
The green-eyed singer stated the headband has by no means been an impediment in her life.
“There’s nothing that I’ve wished to do and never achieved as a result of I put on the veil,” Chaker stated.
Nonetheless, the difficulty of ladies singing has all the time been controversial in conservative Islamic societies.
Though the Koran doesn’t explicitly prohibit singing, or ban girls from performing music, some non secular students frown upon the thought, viewing it as conceited.
Chaker stated her fast household has all the time supported her, however relations in Syria have been “very shocked at first”, primarily as a result of they feared how folks would react.
She stated she receives lots of “damaging feedback” on social media, together with from household and associates.
“It bothers me after all, however I attempt to bear in mind the constructive feedback and the way a lot folks love my music,” she stated.
– ‘Wealthy’ combination –
Chaker traces her inventive influences to her early upbringing in Al Ain, a former desert oasis and now a metropolis in Abu Dhabi, one of many UAE’s seven sheikhdoms.
At residence, her father blasted Arab singers corresponding to Fairouz, an iconic Lebanese singer, and Egyptian diva Umm Kalthoum. Chaker’s mom most well-liked Western music together with Elvis Presley.
“The music combination in the home was all the time wealthy,” she stated, influencing her sound which she describes as a mixture of R&B, hip hop, electro pop, indie and jazz.
A multi-instrumentalist, Chaker credit her father together with her love of the drums, guitar and piano, all devices that she performs.
As a substitute of gifting her toys as a baby, he would purchase her new devices, she stated.
The Center Jap darbuka drum is “the closest to my coronary heart as a result of I usually performed it with my father who loves it very a lot and it’s the foundation of oriental rhythm”, she stated.
Along with Arabic and English, Chaker generally sings in Turkish, Armenian and Persian.
The singer, who carried out within the Lebanese capital Beirut in August, stated she needs to take her music past the Center East.
“It is vitally necessary to me that my music is heard in Europe, in America, in Australia, in the entire world, possibly even in Latin America,” she stated, including that she aspires to “collaborate with many artists from totally different nations”.
“It’s time for the Western world to understand how lovely our music is.”
