Brooklyn-based Pakistani singer Arooj Aftab has bagged her first-ever Grammy on Sunday. This win must be special for Pakistan as Arooj is the first Pakistani woman to receive the prestigious trophy.
Arooj won the award for her song 'Mohabbat' in the Best Global Performance category.
"@Arooj_Aftab's "Mohabbat" wins Best Global Music Performance at the 2022 #GRAMMYs. Aftab is the first Pakistani woman to win a GRAMMY and is also nominated for Best New Artist," a tweet read on the official Twitter account of Grammys.
The 37-year-old Arooj, who has lived in New York for some 15 years has been steadily gaining global attention for her work that fuses ancient Sufi traditions with inflections of folk, jazz and minimalism. Born to Pakistani parents in Saudi Arabia, Aftab spent her teenage years in Lahore before relocating to Boston's prestigious Berklee School of Music to study musical production and engineering.
Aftab moved to the US in 2005 to study music at the Berklee College of Music. She released her first album 'Bird Under Water' in 2014.
In fact, she gained maximum limelight when her track 'Mohabbat' made its way to former US President Barack Obama's annual summer playlist.
Aftab has performed at a number of major New York venues including Lincoln Center and the Museum of Modern Art, also opening for Mitski at The Brooklyn Steel in 2018.
With inputs from ANI