Music Nabiyah Be shows more vulnerable version in debut album: ‘Me, who I am talking to Rolling Stone Brazil, artist detailed career importance as an actress and intimate reflections on what Sun wants writing

Owner of a career already consolidated as an actress, Nabiyah Be debut in music with the most vulnerable version of you. On the disc What the sun wantslaunched in February 2025, the artist gives voice to her intimacy. She looks carefully to her own roots, stuck in Brazil and Jamaica, without forgetting the itinerant spirit of those who lived part of childhood and adolescence traveling the world.

In conversation with Rolling Stone Brazil, Nabiyah Be gives more details about your intimacy. She talks about the creative process of the album, the importance of works as an actress and reveals what the sun wants.

Intimate debut

In the debut album, the artist features 14 songs, which travel between English and Portuguese and aroused people’s curiosity. Although it helped in the first impressions of What the sun wantsthe tongue mixture was not exactly intentional and reflects the artist’s identity as a person.

It was not much thought strategically. I think it was a lot from my experience. I am Bahia, half Jamaican, but I spent my childhood from seven to 11 years in tour around the world, I lived 10 years in New York. So it is very natural for me in my daily life to be changing languages. I didn’t think that when it comes to composing and I think it really reflects the authenticity of the album. ”

When he talks about a work done “from the experience” and about the experiments on a still young tours, Nabiyah It also refers to the father, the Jamaican reggae icon Jimmy cliff. In the album, the father figure appears in the midst of a reflection on the artist’s experience with the “male universe”, which includes experiences with the world.

In the midst of this reflection, a figure assumes an important role: the electric serpent, which appears in the songs and the cover of the disc and acts as a kind of archetype, representing the way with which Nabiyah He sees himself and describes himself in relation to the world.

The electric serpent is a symbol of transformation. Her sincerity can be afraid, as is the Medusa. And it’s that thing to do the bite, how to make the poison itself, the antidote. ”

What the sun wants It is a “genderless album”, but it has a well -defined identity. The percussion, so characteristic of music produced in both Brazil and Jamaica, helps to give a unit. But the highlight is the 1970s vein that guides the songs.

“We go through soul a lot, there is the track ‘I Will Betray You’maybe the root of soul music. He has ‘Everybody’which is very R&B. And there is a lot of Brazilian music too, the tracks ‘What the sun wants’, ‘To walk’they are a lot of my musical taste. ”

The live debut in major events will take place on April 12, 2025 We want! Festival alongside three important names of contemporary Brazilian music: Liniker, Yago Oppio and Anelis Assumpção. As a rookie, Nabiyah Recognizes responsibility, but is eager to live this experience.

The festival is the artist’s first showcase in music and a shared achievement with the entire team that participated in the album. For the show, expectations are very high, with the promise of a Big Band presentation: “I’m happy to see how we will bring these stories and the concept to the stage.”

From music to acting

Nabiyah Be Debuts the musical career with the album, but it is no newbie. She has a story already consolidated as an actress, a world she has experienced as a child. In the theater, participated in Hadestownindicated to 14 categories of Tony in 2019 and winner in eight of them, including Best musical. Still on stage, She became the first Brazilian black woman to win the Drama Desk Award 2018one of the most important theater awards in the United States.

In theaters, it also broke barriers and became the first black Brazilian to star in a movie from Marvel When interpreting the character Beautiful in Black panther. “It was my first movie, imagine. I left the theater doing something super collaborative, even if it was very successful, which was the case Hadestown. But it was my first movie, so I went to make movies and I’ve been to the center of the biggest machine that exists. ”

Nabiyah also worked for the small screens in Daisy Jones & The Sixin which he interpreted Simone Jackson and also helped adapt the book character to the winning series of Emmy.

“I was very welcomed. At the level of them allow me to make script changes, the character’s arc. They really valued a lot for my participation and that was really cool, because I’m a newbie in Hollywood. Despite working for a long time, I’m still a newbie. So that was really cool. ”

With a trajectory already consolidated as an actress, the change to the music even scared at the beginning. But, as a good theater, Nabiyah He learned to turn around with what he has. Living a little of everything, the artist found on each front a different possibility to connect with art – and with herself.

I knew myself a lot as a person, first as a performer. To find this place of silence to compose, the patience to learn a new tool, or to really feel that you dominate an instrument enough for you to compose with it, is another posture. A posture of humility, as the scene asks, but a little more lonely, a little more internal […] Perhaps it is the first time people are really getting to know me. I, who I am. ”

In the midst of an invitation to reflection, an intimate trip on courage, love and transformation, Nabiyah Questions in one of the songs: “Where do You Go from here?” [“Para onde você vai a partir daqui?”, em tradução livre]. The answer is on the tip of the tongue: “For many stages around the world, they can wait for me.”

And what does the sun want? “Shine without explanations, live with an open heart even if it donates. And if some people get burned, your responsibility. ”

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