Wanja Wohoro is a Kenyan indie-soul singer. As far as music is concerned, that is. Otherwise, she’s quite the package. Blends, contrasts and all. For one, she’s just as Australian, matrilineally, as she is Kenyan. Along with other experiences, this has shaped her artistic outlook.
Influenced a great deal by indie rock/pop music in her teenage years, she’s merged her alternative sound to the hip-hop and neo-soul influences of her later years. Her sound, though a reflection of her personality, is also a testament to the different environments she’s found herself in over time. Born in Australia but having spent most of her childhood in Kenya, she moved back to the former at 13, until 2017, when she relocated back to EA. Wanja made the move in part due to the friendly warmth and support in Nairobi. She was also wary of the artistic alienation that can at times come with being a tiny fish in a giant pond like Australia. At present, however, she lives in California in the US.
Her craft has taken on the same mobility as she has herself. Within the realm of her signature sound, she’s curved out space to roam, achieving a rich feel and giving off an aura of ease while at it. There are aspects of her music that are paradoxical, though seemingly effortless as to make one wonder if it’s intended. You can sense her emptying herself, say when her voice wears thin and high, and yet there’s a fullness unique to those moments. A breadth of perception, a thickness of life condensed to the limit in a pocket of sound. And in all this, her guitar is quite the compliment, strummed with deceptive simplicity at times, and layered with technique like atmospheric sound walls in other instances. Her subject matter gels well with this approach. She sings of her womanhood, her joys, angsts, and loves.
Speaking of loves, in no way to decenter her, she’s married to eccentric soul Junior Nyong’o, the younger brother of celebrated actress Lupita Nyong’o. The couple are as free-spirited as they come. And they’ve put out a few songs together like “Dawa” from Wanja’s EP of the same title.
Wanja’s latest output, an absorbing soulful single titled “Splinters”, came out in the first half of the year. It got us excited about where she’s headed on her already commendable trajectory. We’re staying on the look for her next!
