While El Molino prepares to close its doors again very soon, an emerging artist is these days finalizing a concert for this emblematic space in Barcelona. It is the solo debut of twenty-five-year-old Barcelona native Abril Ndjel, who will present her personal project this Friday, June 26, in the evening.
Ndjel explains that she is working on a very carefully crafted staging. "For me, the live performance is as important as the recording of the EP," explains the artist. For this reason, the concert will not only be a reproduction of the four songs from La Moreneta, her first EP, but a way to immerse the audience in her personal universe, with a well-worked live performance and a scenography specifically designed for El Molino, "from the curation and in consonance with the inner world that runs through my entire musical project," she details. In addition, there will also be new songs and many surprises.
This complicity with the audience is one of the things she seeks most, and she considers that this auditorium offers her the ideal space. "It's small enough to maintain proximity with the audience, but at the same time large enough to accommodate many people," she explains.
Performing at El Molino also has a special meaning for her, as she feels it "closes a circle." A few months ago, she already presented La Moreneta in this space at a listening party with other artists. Now she returns solo with her musical project, more consolidated and with a new dimension, which is constantly growing. Tickets are on sale for 12 euros, here.
From her roots
Before starting this solo stage, Ndjel has been part of several music groups, an experience that has allowed her to "learn and grow," she explains proudly. She began her musical career at just 16 years old and, since then, has not stopped. This has been her school, where she has learned what she considers essential in this profession: enjoying music and the freedom to create it.
Now she feels the need to develop her own project, a space where her different roots converge. Her father is from Cameroon and her mother is Catalan, with Andalusian roots; stories and a cultural heritage that she keeps very present when creating and that have always aroused her curiosity. She lives in Vallcarca i els Penitents, in the Gràcia district of Barcelona, a place she claims as her own. From there she has projected herself to the world and this neighborhood is her anchor point. "I consider myself Mediterranean," says Ndjel, who emphasizes that many of her references are deeply Mediterranean and that this has a great influence on the music she creates.
What is her music like?
The singer from Gràcia builds a universe that weaves memory and imagination through her music. Her sound moves between Mediterranean music and Cameroonian folklore, combined with melodic and rhythmic compositions typical of R&B and soft-electronic.
For now, last September she released her first solo EP, called La Moreneta, a work born from diaries and personal texts, where the artist transforms lived experiences into stories that find in music their way of being told.
The EP consists of four songs: Preludi, Deixa’m-ho així, Fan and Amor amor. All of them share the same common thread: platonic love, melancholy and memories. In short, and as a starting point, the artist explains that this project speaks of an experience with which almost all of us can feel addressed: "A unidirectional love story, which is not always visible, with feelings that can cause a lot of pain, but which once overcome, can open the way to self-care."
A metaphor to talk about pain
Beyond talking about heartbreak, in La Moreneta, Ndjel uses a religious allegory to talk about this emotional grief: the suffering of an impossible love and unrequited feelings. "I do it out of respect for believers and religion and from a reading linked to Catalan culture and the cultural symbol of La Moreneta," reflects the singer.
The metaphor serves her to explain emotions that are not always easy to verbalize. Through this figure she speaks of a loss of faith transferred to the realm of love: like a nun who stops believing in God, but applied to an intimate and personal belief, without intending to offend believers.
The four songs on the EP cover different moments of a romantic breakup. From the recent separation, which functions as a prelude, to the most contradictory sensations of a love that still weighs when she discovers that nothing is linear and that one cannot always control the desire for a love that hurts. The journey culminates with the last song, where female empowerment appears and the encounter with self-love, with the discovery of her own inner goddess.
From El Molino to Heliogàbal
After the presentation at El Molino, the singer will continue to unfold her live project. On August 8, she will perform in Sant Jaume de Frontanyà, within the framework of Perifèria Cultural, a very intimate concert in a small town, a fact that she values greatly because it allows her to bring music to the public in its maximum expression.
On the other hand, and already in the city of Barcelona, looking ahead to October, she will prepare a larger format concert at the Heliogàbal venue. All in all, on an agenda that is filling up so that the public can enjoy an emerging artist, but also with experience, and who now hopes to be discovered solo.
