In Iran, women are forbidden to sing in public. A handful of Berlin’s Iranian artists are fighting back with rebellious records.
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| Faravaz Farvadin / Makar Artemev. Courtesy The Berliner. |
In 2016, then-26-year-old Faravaz Farvardin was arrested in Tehran. She’d violated one of the country’s many restrictions on what women are allowed to do: she sang in public. The musician faced a year behind bars.
This May, Faravaz – who has since claimed asylum in Berlin – put out her debut album, Azadi. She performed the record live to a sold-out crowd at SO36, in what was billed as “A Night of Musical Rebellion”.
Since Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, women have been banned from singing solo in public, as part of a wider framework of restrictions imposed on women’s rights. In the decades that followed, many Iranians left the country in search of greater freedom and opportunity abroad. Germany, and Berlin in particular, has become home to a growing Iranian diaspora. And over the past year, several Berlin-based Iranian women have released records that reflect not only their musical heritage but also the ongoing struggles faced by women in Iran. These migrant artists have created a cross-cultural musical scene, forging new sub-genres of Persian sound and embodying the city’s electronic pop and liberal output.
“We are all exilers, doing something we cannot do in our home country,” says Faravaz, who goes by her first name as an artist. Back in Iran, authorities continue to crack down on female artists who find ways to share their voices. “Every time I thought about doing something crazy, I would just look around and see someone doing something crazier than me,” she says.
Released in May, her debut record is an open critique of Iran’s policies. “When women sing in Iran, it’s for love, not money, because there’s so much danger involved,” Faravaz told The Berliner. Azadi, which means ‘freedom’ in Farsi, directly tackles the misogyny women experience in Iran on a daily basis. On the track ‘Enemy of God’, Faravaz sings, “love is forbidden / heart in a prison / joy, keep it hidden / happiness is heresy / so it is written” and, of God, “say he’s kind / then you study / in his name / how to beat / women bloody / just to keep control / of their bodies”. She calls herself the “enemy of God”, asking “if God gave a man all the power, then why’s he killing women like a coward?” It’s a politically charged and provocative album. The opening track, in particular, ‘Mullah’, is a direct attack on Muslim leaders in Iran using their honorific title.
With these tunes, Faravaz has found commercial success in Germany. The singer has amassed over 70K followers on Instagram alone, and this past year has seen the Iranian grace the stages of Pop-Kultur in Berlin, Dortmund’s Queer-Festival and the Deutsches SchauSpielHaus in Hamburg. But Faravaz isn’t alone in exorcising the struggles of her upbringing with her art.
“After a while, I realized there was a lot of trauma in my music,” explains Dornika Kazerani, a Tehran-born singer whose high-energy debut single, ‘Fatbulous’, celebrates the type of female body usually shamed. At the age of seven, the gender-fluid artist and drag performer moved with her mother to the US, but moved back to Tehran shortly after, before relocating to Berlin in 2017. “In Iran, there are so many restrictions placed on women’s bodies, but there’s always a defiance to do things, sing, and perform in public.”
Dornika has done just that: she’s played more than 150 shows across Europe, including at pride events, well-known club nights like Gegen and Hoe_mies, and the Fusion and WHOLE festivals. “For me, I love these cross-disciplinary community-driven spaces here in Berlin, like ACUD and 90mil, and specific events and parties, like Lunchbox Candy, where I’ve also played,” she says.
Her playful, electronic sound takes a few pages out of Peaches’ book, embodying many of Berlin’s liberal aesthetics. “I love Peaches, but I wasn’t so into her music at first,” Dornika says of the comparison. With her latest release, ‘Baggy Jeans’, the gender-fluid Iranian-American continues to explore themes of body positivity and queerness. It’s part of a creative dialogue that runs parallel to her drag alter-ego, Many Faced Godx. “My music is informed by my experience as a woman and queer person who not only lived in Iran, but also as an Iranian in the US post-9/11, dealing with life in Germany, and striving to make a change,” she says.
Striking a chord
In December last year, Iranian singer Parastoo Ahmadi was arrested in Iran after broadcasting a live concert to her YouTube channel, in which she sang without a hijab. The story made worldwide news. “It was an incredibly brave act and touched every person who has experienced being a woman in Iran,” Dornika says about the incident. “Not wearing a hijab and defying these rules did something for sure.”
Changing outdated and stereotypical perspectives about Iranians through song is an ongoing process. “I feel that in the West, the emphasis is put on our experiences in Iran without wanting to address our experiences here,” explains Dornika.
This is a view shared by Iranian Berliner MADANii (aka Dena Zarrin). “As soon as you take people from the Global South and put them in the country where they’re not part of the dominant culture, then it doesn’t matter where you’re from, because you’re all perceived as the same.” The daughter of Iranian refugees who moved to Germany, MADANii embraces her mixed cultural heritage through her music. Raised in Bavaria, MADANii moved to Berlin in 2015, drawn to the city’s music scene. She first released several EPs with production partner LLUCID; it wasn’t until earlier this year that she released a debut solo EP, BiiLINGUAL. It’s a record that utilises Iranian elements – Farsi, traditional melodies – alongside modern alternative RnB and electronic styles.
“I wouldn’t say I’m a representative of Iranian culture, as I’m more of a transplant here,” says MADANii, whose artist moniker is tied to her mother’s maiden name. “I’ve only been to Iran twice, and mainly experienced Iranian culture through my family. My music deals with this experience of homelessness and being between cultures, which is when you feel like you don’t belong anywhere fully.”
Following the death of 22-year-old Kurdish-Iranian woman Mahsa Amini, who was detained by Iran’s morality police in September 2022 for not wearing a proper hijab and died in custody under suspicious circumstances, Iranians at home and abroad took to the streets in what would become known as the ‘Woman, Life, Freedom’ movement. Covered by media across the world, the campaign drew attention once again to the mistreatment women were still suffering under strict Islamic law.
“Since the protests, there’s more awareness and a greater openness to talk about Iranians,” MADANii explains. “That something coming out of Iran was positive, feminist or revolutionary helped Iranians to be confident. It was cool to be Iranian and be proud of it. At the same time, it did something with the diaspora. I’ve never been so connected with the Iranian community in Germany at that time.”
Parisa Eskandari, one half of former production duo Pari San, was also heavily influenced by the Woman, Life, Freedom movement. Her song ‘Chador’ is a haunting and experimental meditation on repression, told through the use of experimental electronics. “[The] music video is a direct critique of the regime,” explains Eskandari, who has since broken off as a solo artist. “The video addresses the systemic abuse, violence and killings committed by the Islamic regime in Iran.”
Eskandari moved from Tehran to Germany with her parents when she was three years old, relocating to Berlin around 2020. After a chance meeting in a café, she began collaborating with renowned music producer Tricky, releasing a pair of singles on his False Idols label. The musician’s deep and experimental musical style is often backed by her unique contemporary dance performances. “Through my art, I aim to spark conversations – within the Iranian diaspora and beyond – about political and religious power structures, and to create change through artistic expression.”
‘Chador’ also had a deeper meaning for Eskandari, as she had also experienced jail time in Iran. She was arrested just over 13 years ago for not wearing a chador – a full-body dress, required in certain parts of Iran – in public. “After two weeks in detention, my parents were able to buy my freedom, but many girls aren’t that lucky,” she says. “Some have disappeared, or been abused in captivity for months, sometimes years.” The threats to autonomy she faced in Iran followed her to Germany. “After the release of ‘Chador’, I was even put under German police protection,” Eskandari told The Berliner.
Changing the tune
Berlin has long had a large Iranian population. Nowadays, the voices of the more than 13,000 Iranians registered in Berlin are becoming louder – not only through music releases, but also through the number of other music-scene options in town. Disco Tehran events regularly sell out at Gretchen, while events like RANGARANG, Bandari & Techno and Persian Love, which were rare to find on the city’s cultural calendar a decade ago, pop up often. “I was thinking, why is this all happening now?” MADANii reflects. “It must be an age thing. The kids who immigrated to Germany after the revolution of 1979 are now grown-ups, and engaging more with things. I’ve also met more Iranians who came here in the past five years… I don’t know if that’s a subjective feeling or based on anything particular.” It’s not subjective: almost 5,000 Iranians have moved to the capital since 2019, and the population has exploded in the last decade, up 178% from 2014.
Currently, MADANii is working on a new podcast called Azizam, telling the story of a German-Iranian family. “I spoke to a sociologist about this topic, and it seems there has been a shift in German society, showing a new confidence in migrants,” she says. “That idea of complete assimilation has shifted. Since 2016, there’s been a big shift in German society, with more people of colour in the media. The social climate has shifted to accommodate this.”
The growing influence of Iranian culture in Berlin’s music scene will no doubt carry that further. With new releases planned by both Dornika and Eskandari, the future of Persian music, especially in Berlin, is female. “I think it’s a positive thing that people are becoming interested in Iran,” Favaraz says. “Beforehand, people didn’t know that women couldn’t sing in Iran. We are seen more now.”
Via The Berliner
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