Jojo Abot
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Jojo Abot (born 4 August 1988) is a Ghanaian artist and musician, based in Brooklyn, New York City. Her creative output spans video direction, acting, modeling, singing and multimedia performance. Abot's work taps into her home country, using her first language, Ewe, as a source to title her work and as a point of origin for musical inspiration. Her musical inspirations include
Fela Kuti Fela Aníkúlápó Kuti (born Olufela Olusegun Oludotun Ransome-Kuti; 15 October 1938 – 2 August 1997), also known as Abami Eda, was a Nigerian musician, bandleader, composer, political activist, and Pan-Africanist. He is regarded as the p ...
and Ebo Taylor. Abot has toured and performed with Kuti’s youngest son Seun Kuti, as well as rapper Common and Bob Marley’s son Stephen. She has also supported Lauryn Hill, whose influence can also be felt alongside that of Eryka Badu. Abot's origin story and family history play an important role in her musical work. For instance, her grandmother's name ''FYFA WOFO'' inspired the name of her debut album in 2016. ''FYFA'' ''WOFO'' centers around a narrative in which an African woman becomes pregnant with a white man's child. Abot developed ''FYFA WOFO'' into a multimedia project while she participated in NEW INC, the New Museum's incubator for artists, designers and technologists. Abot's music bends genres and is inspired by jazz, afropunk, hip hop and soul, as well as tribal and indigenous sounds. She is concerned with themes ranging from black empowerment, personal histories, identity and spirituality. Her second EP, ''NGIWUNKULUNKULU'', was released in 2018. ''NGIWUNKULUNKULU'' translates to "I am God" in Zulu and is the result of her personal identity exploration in reaction to apartheid's lasting impact in Johannesburg, South Africa. Both ''NGIWUNKULUNKULU'' and FYFA WOFO showcase Abot's signature sound and style, which she calls “afro-hypno-sonic,” a blend of Afrobeat, futuristic soul and electronic beats. In 2018, Abot was an artist in residence at
National Sawdust National Sawdust is a nonprofit music producer and venue in Brooklyn, New York with the goal of providing "composers and musicians across genres... a setting where they are given unprecedented support and critical resources essential to create and ...
. Later on September 24, 2022 National Sawdust hosted the première of the immersive and experiential opera, "A Good of Her Own Making," written and created by Jojo Abot in collaboration with five-time Grammy winning musician and restorative arts devotee, Esperanza Spalding.


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* * * {{Portal bar, Biography, Africa, Music Musicians from Brooklyn Artists from Brooklyn Ghanaian musicians Living people 1988 births