ISLAMABAD: Arooj Aftab, the first Pakistani to be nominated in the best new artist category for the Grammy Awards, is up for two awards as the highest honors in the global music industry are handed out at a live ceremony in Las Vegas on Sunday.
Other best new artist nominees are country music singer Jimmie Allen, American singer-songwriter Olivia Rodrigo, rapper Saweetie, rapper Baby Keem, singer Finneas, British band Glass Animals, Korean-American indie rock group Japanese Breakfast, Australian breakout star The Kid Laroi, and British singer Arlo Parks.
This year's Grammys were pushed to April from January because of a COVID-19 surge at the beginning of the year. The date swap forced a change in venue from Los Angeles to the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas.
Last year, the pandemic forced a scaled-down outdoor ceremony without the traditional audience of thousands.
“Let’s gooooo,” Aftab posted in an Instagram story on Sunday afternoon, ahead of the Grammy Awards ceremony.
Aftab, who has lived in the US for nearly two decades since she left Pakistan for Boston to study at the Berklee College of Music, told Arab news last year her music owes a large debt to her hometown, Lahore, and the music and the poetry of her country of origin.
The 36-year-old began to make headlines in 2018, when the National Public Radio (NPR) listed her "Lullaby" as one of the 200 Greatest Songs by 21st Century Women+ and the New York Times celebrated her "Island No 2" among the Best Classical Music Tracks of 2018.
Her rendition of a famous Urdu ghazal, "Mohabbat," was on Former US president Barack Obama's summer playlist alongside Ella Fitzgerald, Jay-Z, The Rolling Stones, Drake and Bob Dylan. It has also been nominated in the Grammy's best global music performance category for 2022.
