Qing Madi’s announcement of Vision’s remix was shrouded in mystery. Posting a graphic that displayed the silhouette of the secret guest artist, now revealed to be Chlöe Bailey, Madi asked her million-plus followers across social media apps to guess who the star in the shadow was. When I ask her later if any of them had come close to guessing correctly, she laughs. “No, there was nobody even half of close, nobody, they weren’t expecting it.” A few years ago, she probably wouldn’t have expected it either.
Born Chimamanda Chukwuma, Qing Madi is the brightest gem in Nigeria’s music scene and looks on her way to taking her place alongside its greats. Even now, the foundations of what promises to be a great career are already in place. She fashions brilliant melodies out of relatable social, often romantic experiences, and her composition and lyricism meet with an equally riveting pull. All of these were on display as early as See Finish, her debut track that she wrote and recorded at the age of sixteen. Before its release she had earned some fame as the TikToker making covers for popular songs, dancing to other songs or simply shooting goofy videos like the app’s other users, who encouraged her to put out original music. After, however, she’s taken up a new life, one that has seen her tap into the depths of her creative wells and receive a commensurate level of recognition for it. She has released a debut eponymous EP to rapturous applause, opened for BNXN on his tours, recorded vocals for Wizkid’s latest project, and seen her songs hit number 1 in countries she’s never visited. Yet, her biggest wins lie undoubtedly on the other side of the journey.
Source: Qing Madi
Over Google Meet we discuss her incredible story so far. Our first interview is one week before the release of Vision remix, and three days before Chlöe was due to be announced as its guest star. She’s been forbidden from discussing this with the public just yet, so we play an unwinnable guessing game where she tries to convey the experience working with her without revealing who she is. “It was amazing. This person is so warm, super friendly and this person just has such a warm energy and this person’s team is amazing.” I understand, I say, hardly understanding at all. A few days later she tells me that what she loves most is how they were able to connect so seamlessly on the track. “Chlöe’s understanding of music and my understanding of music is such a beautiful blend. I’m excited that this collaboration is something different.”
It’s tough being a music star signed to a major label in today’s world, where engagement is currency and content is how it is earned. Certain announcements have to be made at certain times and coupled with certain content, or they fail to reach the required number of eyeballs and a release already starts failing before it even debuts. For a teenager, Qing Madi is navigating it all rather gracefully. Perhaps this is because, even before she first stepped into a studio, her life’s journey was already headed there. “I think the course of my life was always going towards music somehow. My mom was a dancer and she knew I could sing, so she was already in support, and you know when your mom is in support, everything just seems like that’s what you’re meant to do in life. I never really had the moment where I was like ‘maybe I should be a singer’.”
And yet, Nigeria’s system initially had other plans for her. She came to Lagos to further her education and enroll into university to acquire a degree in Law, but See Finish arrived just in time to provide an alternative path. The exposure from it brought label executives and A&Rs to her DM, and unlocked a key collaboration for her with BNXN. She recalls the day she stumbled on BNXN vibing to her song in a video on Instagram, “My friend was like “BNXN just vibed to your song.” I went to his DM just to thank him but I didn’t really expect him to respond. But he said “thank you so much for this song, your music excites my soul, I would love to work with you”
It has been an ethereal experience coming to the realization that this is her life now, and now she takes it all in stride. She’s friends with BNXN, who she affectionately describes “a big brother”; receives encouragement from Wande Coal, who checks up on her and offers advice; has spent studio sessions with none other than Wizkid, providing backup vocals, an experience that may or may not have culminated in them making a song together. She wouldn’t reveal. In all of this attention and publicity, Qing Madi is careful to iterate that the music is the source and sustainer of it all. “It’s exciting that all of this has happened in a short period and it happened solely because of the music, because that is the thing that I place above everything: the fact that the music has brought all of this together.”
Source: Qing Madi
Her fans describe her music affectionately and humorously as ‘Afro-delulu’, which is the kind of label you should expect when you make a song about craving and eventually stealing a taken man, and follow it up with another about flying the love of your life around the world and asking for a wedding ring. These tracks, Ole and American Love respectively, are undoubtedly her biggest and most-loved thus far, and they bear her youth and the untainted view of love it affords. They glide in the corridor between Afropop and Afro RnB, where Madi is most comfortable, and where she can turn them into irresistible earworms.
Some of her best songs would not exist, however, were the executive decisions left to Qing Madi. “I was really scared of Ole coming out because it’s one of those songs I made with my producer as a joke. I was also embarrassed for my mother to hear it because she has to hear all of my music before it comes out.” She says, still a little self-conscious about the song’s brashly covetous theme. “I didn’t know that my management listened to it and took it seriously.” Any misgivings she had about releasing the song to the public dissipated when BNXN chose to jump on its second verse, forging a thematic chemistry with Madi that earned the song praise for its masterful writing.
Madi is very particular and exacting about her creative method, the process by which she crafts raw, unformed melodies, gives them lyrical form, and places them into instrumentals to make a complete song. First, she requires very specific environmental and emotional conditions to tease out the music, and this includes even the clothes she wears, as she prefers loose-fitting clothes that offer more comfort and confidence. Almost all the time she prefers to compose the bones of the song first and have her producer work the beat around it, but more recently she is beginning to work in the reverse direction.
She loves the songwriting process, and it shows in the selection of artists she admires. She’s listened to all Kendrick Lamar’s albums multiple times, because “they give me so much inspiration, his storytelling ability and his pen.” She would love to work with Peruzzi, “an intelligent writer, if not one of the most intelligent writers,” and Fave, whom she names more than once as a big sister and her favorite female artist. She looks up to BNXN, who she describes as “one of the smartest writers I know.” If she didn’t get into performing music herself, Madi reckons she could have made a decent earning being an uncredited ghostwriter for others, an undertaking she had begun whilst pursuing her education.
Now front and center of her own career, Madi enjoys being able to connect to fans through her music. Over the Easter weekend this year, she performed at Femme Fest in Lagos, gave a performance at Play Hilton, Abuja, and returned to Lagos for her first appearance at the annual Homecoming festival alongside stars like Odumodublvck and Zlatan.
For Qing Madi, the women currently leading the industry, Tems and Ayra Starr, provide the greatest inspiration as they constantly redefine what is possible for Nigerian women in the global music scene. “I’m very proud and excited to be in the era when all of this is happening because it kind of creates hope for me. If they can do it, then I can. It even affects my writing, because I realize that I can write music for the world, not just for Nigeria or Africa.” Her stage name was borne out of a similar feminist ideal, the realization she had in a secondary school class that the queen was still often expected to be subjugated to a king despite being the pinnacle of female royalty. Her identity as Qing Madi was informed by a rejection of this worldview. “I decided to create a name around it. The Q is for femininity because I am a woman, but it sounds like ‘king’ because my place in life and my career doesn’t depend on anyone else.”
With wisdom like this at her fingertips, it is easy to forget that, at 17, Madi is still legally a child in her parents’ care. How much autonomy does she have? “I don’t think I have a lot. Some people are like “oh wow I love the amount of freedom that you have.” It’s worse now because my mom is still very much in control, she picks most of my songs for releases, and she’s very involved in the process. She’s very knowledgeable when it comes to these things so she has a lot of say in my career, and a presence in my regular daughter-mother life.” Madi is excited to turn eighteen on the first of July, a birthday she shares with Chlöe. So far she has had to endure much speculation and outright accusations about her age, but she takes it all as a compliment. “The fact that people don’t believe my age right now is so crazy. It only means that they don’t expect me to be doing or accomplishing this much at this stage. But there is still a lot more to come and I can’t wait for everybody to hear it.” Qing Madi is writing her destiny, and the world is eagerly awaiting the next chapter.