I am the UK’s first and only deaf music producer, writer, and performer to have integrated British Sign Language (BSL) into live hip-hop music performance.
In other words: I rap with my hands.
People often ask me how I can enjoy music as a deaf person. I’m deaf in my right ear and can pick up a little sound in my left ear thanks to a hearing aid. I don’t hear full lyrics but, if I’m in a club, I can feel the beat and the bass. The music pulses through your feet on the floor, the bass moving up your body. It helps my creativity to think of music as something you feel. If a beat catches my attention, I’ll find out the track title and look up the lyrics when I get home – something lots of hearing people do, too.
When I was young, my big brother was watching a Michael Jackson music video on TV, and I was so moved by his dancing. At that time subtitles weren’t available for the music video, so I could only sense the beat through his movements. Despite not hearing the sound, I was fascinated and caught the music bug. I was inspired to forge my own path in the music industry. I loved the creativity of making my own beats and rhymes which would speak to deaf people just as much as they would hearing people.
It’s a dream of mine to have that kind of impact on a young person – to inspire them to go out and be confident in their creativity.
I grew up feeling inspired by hearing artists, but my writing process is a little different from theirs. I start by writing lyrics, like a lot of musicians. But I then have to interpret my own lyrics into BSL so that I can perform them. It’s hard work, more than you’d think, and I absolutely love it. After that, I’ll work it over in the studio on top of a beat.