ShakoyahD. is an uprising artist from Jersey. Her music style stays between Jazz, RnB, and even some bits of classical music.
ShakoyahD.’s Background
The “Is It Me?” artist’s musical career “started in the church choir. When I was little, my mom was the choir director. I started off in the choir, and I just loved singing.”
Later on, ShakoyahD. went to school at the University of New Haven. She studied the music industry there. “I majored in the music industry because no matter what I chose, I wanted to make sure I understood whatever contracts I signed,” ShakoyahD. explained her academic background. “Because a lot of times you hear about people going into the industry, them getting screwed over because they didn’t know what they were signing or they didn’t read through their contract or anything like that.
Of course, I wanted to ensure I had a manager and all that stuff. But until I get a manager, I want to ensure that I can understand any contracts, anything I sign, or any opportunities laid before me. I just want to fully understand what I’m walking into.”
Importance Of Knowledge
ShakoyahD.’s background in the music business has been helpful too. “I’m still very early in my career because I just decided to take everything completely seriously. It is starting to help. It’s helping me to navigate. Because I’m completely independent, and right now, I don’t really have like a full-blown team or anything like that. It helped me to know that a sync license is an option.
Often, when we go in as an artist, we think, “oh, I just need to put this song out; I’m going to blow up that way.” Or we believe that the only opportunity is to release music through streaming platforms or try to write for other artists. And those are really great opportunities as well. But there are other avenues where you can make money, you can monetize, you can have a full-blown career, and you’re not necessarily, it’s not only from the streams because streams don’t even pay that much. So now, it’s definitely been helping me expand my mind and think outside of the box to turn this into a full-time career.”
ShakoyahD.’s Music
“I recently released my EP “The Love Game,” on Sep 17. So from here, as far as moving forward, I have some singles I’m getting ready to release. I know I have a single coming out next month, “Get Out My Face.” So that one is more like it’s a little bit different. I love the song. It’s more on the hip-hop side of things, but it is a great song.
Right now, my goal is to continue to build my catalog. I’ll be releasing more and more music throughout the next year or so and just working on perfecting sound and progressing in my sound. And then from there, I want to work on getting some sync licensing deals and different things like that.
The message that I’m trying to send with the music I make is, “The goal is really just authenticity.” It’s okay to be who you are and be true to who you are, whether that’s through love, whether that’s just through self-love, or self-expression; that’s something that I’m huge on and making sure that I’m doing and that I’m expressing through my music.
I want people to know while they’re listening to my music, to feel like, “yeah, I could do anything” or “it’s okay to be me, I can authentically express myself in any way, and it’ll be okay.””
The interview is brought by Nikita Serdiuk | IG: @nikitasrdk | Twitter: @nktserdiuk
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