Amaarae released her ‘Black Star’ album in August 2025
Amid criticisms that Amaarae does not collaborate with local Ghanaian artistes, the US-based Ghanaian singer has explained that she had actually tried to feature several Ghanaian acts on her Black Star album but was unsuccessful.
In an interview on the Sincerely Accra Podcast, which aired on January 19, 2026, she noted that people assume she deliberately avoids collaborating with local artistes because they are unaware of what happens behind the scenes.
According to her, efforts were made to secure verses from Ghanaian artistes for her album which was released in August 2025, but most attempts did not materialise.
She disclosed that track 13 on the ‘Black Star’ album, titled ‘Free the Youth,’ originally had a verse from Arathejay, but it did not make the final cut.
Calling my Ghanaian identity performative is rubbish – Amaarae
“Arathejay has a verse on ‘Free The Youth’ that didn’t make it because we went back and forth on notes, it just didn’t go where I needed it to go,” she said, explaining that there was a specific note she wanted that could not be achieved.
Amaarae also disclosed that she reached out to Shatta Wale through social media for a collaboration, but she never got a response until after the project was released.
“I DMed Shatta Wale like 50 times…I wanted to do something completely new with him. Since I was coming to Ghana to shoot the visuals, I wanted to sit with him and be like, if we take Shatta Wale and we take Amaarae, where do we go with this? But he didn’t respond to my DM,” she noted.
She added that other Ghanaian creatives including Gaffachi and Nshorna Muzik were also contacted but could not make it onto the final project, which is why no local artiste appeared on the ‘Black Star’ album despite her efforts.
“So the point that we were trying to make is that I made the effort. But at the end of the day too, Black Star for me was my interpretation of where I see the future of Ghanaian music,” she added.
Watch the video below:
🇬🇭🚨🎶 “I tried getting AratheJay, Shatta Wale and NshornaMuzik on my BLACK STAR album but it didn’t work out.”
— Amaarae (@amaarae) clears the air on why there aren’t more Ghanaian artists featured on BLACK STAR via @SincerelyAccra pic.twitter.com/CHaYQ6XrTX
— Amplify Ghana (@Amplifygh) January 19, 2026
Meanwhile watch GhanaWeb’s exclusive interview with Ghanaian musician/comedian David Oscar Dogbe
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