Arooj Aftab, a Pakistani vocalist based in Brooklyn, won a Grammy award this Sunday in the Best Global Performance category, to become the first-ever Pakistani artist to win a Grammy.
Arooj Aftab’s Mohabbat wins Best Global Music Performance at the 2022 #GRAMMYs, the official Twitter handle of Grammys announced in a Tweet. Aftab is the first Pakistani woman to win a GRAMMY and was also nominated for Best New Artist.
“I am beyond thrilled,” the artist told journalists backstage at the pre-gala ceremony, at which the vast majority of awards are handed out. “It feels great.”
“I think I’m gonna faint. Wow, thank you so much. I feel like this category in itself has been so insane like Burna Boy, Wizkid, Femi Kuti, Angélique Kidjo…” Aftab said in her acceptance speech.
Aftab’s nomination immediately made the rounds on Pakistani social media. Here is how Pakistanis celebrated the win on Twitter.
Fellow performer Fifi Haroon wrote: “WOW! Pakistani singer #AroojAftab gets nominated for a #Grammy in the New Artist Category for an Urdu song!”
Profile of Arooj Aftab
The 37-year-old Arooj was born to Pakistani parents in Saudi Arabia and spent her teenage years in Lahore before she relocated to Boston to study musical production and engineering at the prestigious Berklee School of Music.
The vocalist has lately been gaining steady global attention for her work which is a beautiful amalgam of ancient Sufi traditions with folk, jazz, and minimalism.
She released her third studio album Vulture Prince to critical acclaim and gained even more attention after former US President Barack Obama included the track Mohabbat on his 2021 summer favorites list.
Arooj has performed at a number of major New York venues including the opening for Mitski at The Brooklyn Steel in 2018, the Museum of Modern Art and Lincoln Center and the Museum of Modern Art.
She’s also up for the coveted Best New Artist prize, which will be presented during the main Grammy telecast later Sunday.