Video: Afrobeats icon Tiwa Savage basks in historic music deal

Nigerian singer-songwriter and one of Africa’s biggest music stars Tiwa Savage says she is very humbled and excited after signing a global music deal with Universal Music Group (UMG).

She says, taking her music to a worldwide audience can only mean one thing.
A revolution going on in African music.

“It’s very exciting. The support and the love is overwhelming. It’s an exciting time and I’m very humbled and very excited that they are backing my brand,” said the Nigerian recording artist.

The Afrobeats music star continues to receive congratulatory messages from the continent and beyond though it seems she forgot to give the good news to the most important person in her life.

“My mom was ‘Tiwa! Tiwatope! Why didn’t you tell me all along?’ I’m like, ‘Mom, I know you can’t keep a secret.’ But she’s excited. She sent, we have a family group chat and she was just like, ‘Tiwa has crashed the internet again today!’ And she put like a smiley face. So she’s super, super proud of me.”

Tiwa has succesfully defied the odds in a male dominated Afrobeats industry. She is the only woman to have won the MTV Europe Music Awards in the best African act category.

Even though international audiences may not understand some of the language, she says “they can feel the soul in the music” and the themes of her songs are universal.

“When I was performing to see tears in their eyes and to have them singing all of my songs word for word was, I mean, I said it on stage, I was like, ‘This is really really emotional. This is crazy.’ Like, it was so beautiful and I felt connected to every single person. The love was amazing, you know, they showed me so much love and I just want to do more of it.

Under the agreement, Tiwa will make music with UMG and have access to their infrastructure and distribution tools.

Her future music will be released to a wider international audience through UMG’s operations in 60 countries across the globe.