Montenegrin rapper Eli Jane, she shared first place with her colleague from Slovenia, Sahara, at the recently held final of the international project “She Raps” (They rap) in Zagreb, whose goal is the empowerment and professionalization of female rappers.
“In the great atmosphere of Zagreb’s Jiggy Bar, they introduced themselves to the audience and the jury Ramona i Daria from Croatia, Sahara and Sake from Slovenia, Madanna from Serbia, George from Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as OFF 47 and Eli Jane from Montenegro. After individual performances and a joint song, the jury consisting of a rapper and a radio presenter Tone Tuoro, organizer Josipa Galić, a model Superbabekillah and designer Kata from Plakat, chose two ‘She Raps’ Balkans winners: Ellie Jane from Budva and Saharey from Ljubljana”, announced the organizers.
As they pointed out, the winners will continue their journey to Europe and participate in additional workshops, performances and joint songs with the winners of the “She Raps” program from Portugal, Belgium and France.
“All the girls are coming to Zagreb in February 2025, where they will be in the studio with a legendary Croatian producer Koolade to record a joint song and a video clip”, the statement added.
The “She Raps” project is based on the initiative of the French agency Rafe, and was supported by the Creative Europe program backed by the European Union.
“The project came to life as a collaboration of four European countries (France, Belgium, Portugal and Croatia, i.e. the region), and about twenty girls applied for participation, after which the jury chose the eight already mentioned finalists. From June 27 to July 5, they went through thorough and very practical full-day workshops at the United Pop Academy in Zagreb,” the organization says.
The lecturers for the finalists were hip-hop personalities and professionals from the music industry: Dario Draštata (Dallas Records), Goran Komerički (HR Radio), producer of Koolade and Jan Kinchl, rappers librarian (THEY), Smoke Mardeliano (Serbia) and Maze (Portugal), graffiti artist Krešo Golubić i Phat Philly.
“We recorded joint songs, wrote rhymes, learned about the music industry, digital platforms and algorithms, hip-hop culture and history, basic elements of studio and recording, practiced performances, and visited the most interesting graffiti spots in Zagreb. The girls also had a professional photo shoot, and among other things, they went home with professional photos, which they will be able to use further,” emphasized the organizers of the competition.
“The final evening was held in Zagreb’s “Jiggy Bar”, where all eight finalists performed three songs each in a great atmosphere in front of a very select audience: Port Barbic from TBF, Davor Franjić from dallas, Anera Stopfer from the Ministry of Culture, Retro Flava, editor of Blackout Hip Hop portal, young rapper Bars, Richy Muirhead from Glasgow, organizer of the Pitch Scotland conference and many others. ‘She Raps’ mentor, who prepared the girls for the stage performance for the last two days, was the Belgrade rapper Smoke Mardeljano. He heated up the atmosphere brilliantly with his hard, now it can be said, classics, and then he pulled out slips of paper with names to determine the order of the girls’ performances, which certainly gave it extra charm,” the statement said.
As it is pointed out, the reason for launching this project was a survey conducted by Rafe Productions in February 2023, according to which, although rap is generally the most listened to music genre, especially among young people, men are dominantly represented in it.
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