OORDAYA

“Deep and intimate. These are the words with which Oordaya likes to describe her music. Since her debut in 2017, the 22-year-old singer has built a soaring, magnetic universe based on catchy trap-soul melodies, a bewitching voice, and lyrics that intend to purge the spleen of past memories. It’s true that there’s a lot more nostalgia and sadness than joy in my music…!” she laughs. I guess it’s a way for me to heal wounds. Originally from the South of France, Clara (her first name) developed a cathartic relationship with music as a teenager when, after seven years spent between Jordan and Botswana with her family, she returned to settle in her hometown. Having to leave everything behind – my friends, my habits, my home – and having to rebuild everything… it was very hard,” she recalls. I didn’t know who I was anymore. In this period of uncertainty, writing and dance (which she had been practicing for many years) became her refuge. Night and day, the young woman transformed her thoughts into poems, inspired by Sade, Jhené Aiko, Adèle and Jorja Smith. Alone in the shelter of her bedroom, she eventually gave life to two EPs in English, which landed her a signature on the Epic Records label, via which she shared the four-title Twenty With Love in 2022.