Angelique Kidjo breaks new ground in Tinseltown

Will become first African musician to get star on Hollywood Walk of Fame

LOS ANGELES:

Five-time Grammy winner Angelique Kidjo is set to be honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on Tuesday, becoming the first African musician and first Black African to be recognized on the famed boulevard.

Born in Benin, the artist has built an international career spanning more than 40 years and was once dubbed "Africa's premier diva" by Time magazine.

"Angelique Kidjo's extraordinary artistry and global influence have inspired audiences across generations and continents," Hollywood Walk of Fame producer Ana Martinez said in a news release.

"We are proud to honor her as the first African artist to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, recognizing her remarkable contributions to music and culture around the world."

The 66-year-old musician will be accompanied by Oscar-nominated American actor Willem Dafoe and record producer Harvey Mason Jr at the ceremony on Tuesday morning.

"I may be the first African female singer to have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, but I am convinced that I will not be the last," Kidjo told AFP when her Hollywood star was announced last year.

"Many others will follow, and that fills my heart with joy," she said at the time.

Angélique Kidjo is a Beninese musician, actress, and activist. Kidjo has won five Grammy Awards and a Polar Music Prize. She has collaborated with artists including Alicia Keys, Peter Gabriel, John Legend, Philip Glass, Bono, Yo-Yo Ma, and Burna Boy. She is the second African artist - and the first of African ethnicity - to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She performed at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games Opening Ceremony on July 23, 2021. In 2021, Time magazine included her in its list of the 100 most influential people in the world. Kidjo is fluent in five languages: Fon, French, Yorùbá, Gen (Mina) and English. She sings in all of them, and she also has her own personal language, which includes words that serve as song titles such as "Batonga". Kidjo often uses Benin's traditional Zilin vocal technique and vocalese.

Kidjo has been a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador since 2002. With UNICEF, she has travelled to many countries in Africa. Reports on her visits can be found on the UNICEF site: Benin, Senegal, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Syria, Malawi, Uganda, Kenya, Sierra Leone, Zimbabwe, South Africa and Haiti.

Along with Mary Louise Cohen and John R. Phillips, Kidjo founded the Batonga Foundation, which empowers some of the most vulnerable and hardest-to-reach young women and girls in Benin with the knowledge and skills they need to be agents of change in their own lives and communities. Batonga accomplishes this by locating the most vulnerable adolescent girls in Benin and connecting them to girl-centred safe spaces led by Beninese women.