From volunteer to singing sensation

AFTER finishing high school in Germany, Deena Herr decided to spend her gap year in Rwanda volunteering at a charity centre for street children. Three years later, through a series of chance events, Herr, 22, has become a very unlikely pop star in neighbouring Uganda. A self- taught musician who speaks six languages – including Kinyarwanda and some Swahili – Herr got noticed for singing, apparently without an accent, in Luganda, the country’s most widely spoken language.

A music video of her first single, the Afro- beat love song Mumulete, written with Meddie Menz, quickly went viral on social media, shared by thousands of Ugandans shocked that a white person could sing flawlessly in their native tongue.

Herr said she was overwhelmed by the reaction. “It was a huge surprise,” she said by phone from Kampala, where she is finishing up an internship in social work while recording her first album on the local label Ruff N Tuff. “It’s playing on the radio, on the streets, in the clubs, some people even have it on their phones.”

The following are excerpts from a conversation.

You had serious doubts about whether to release your first single in Luganda. What were you afraid of?

Honestly, I thought when we came out with this song that people here would be offended by me – because I’m white and I’m doing their music. But actually, it was a very big welcome. People were like, “No matter where you come from, what you look like, if you take the time to learn our language, and love our language, you’re welcome here.”

Do you think you have a gift for languages?

I guess I do. Even in school I spoke four languages fluently and picked up some Portuguese when I travelled in Brazil. In every country I go to, I try to learn the language. In Rwanda, the street children I worked with didn’t speak English or French, so I needed to learn Kinyarwanda. The kids helped me a lot. It’s a whole different system from European languages. Luganda is even harder. I’m still learning it and I try to practise my vocabulary every night.

How did your Ugandan music career begin?

I have friends in the music business here who knew I sang and had an ear for African languages. A producer saw that I had no accent, and they decided right then to record a song. But before we released it, they wanted me to sing in one show just to see how people would react. They took me to the National Theatre. Before the main show started, I played on a little stage and it was just a big success. People were so surprised. So we decided, “OK, let’s release it.” Do you find it problematic that you’re getting all this attention for singing Ugandan music when so few local musicians are recognised outside of Africa?

That’s the topic that concerns me the most. What will people say? It gives me an opportunity to show Uganda or East Africa from another side – the music industry, the glamour and the beauty of this culture.