Peruvian artist Renata Flores pulls out all the stops for her London debut.
Often labelled the ‘Queen of Quechua Rap’, Renata Flores is a rising 25-year-old rapper and singer hailing from Ayacucho, Peru. She is rapidly earning a name for herself in South America as a champion for indigenous music and language with a modern twist (think panpipes meets trap). Fittingly, she wears a fabric crown with four points; it originates, she tells us, from the indigenous Wari (Huari) culture of the Andes.
During her set she brings out dancers, musicians and a special guest appearance from Imperio Bamba for a Qam Hina – a psychedelic cumbia mashup of Pink Floyd’s Another Brick in the Wall in Quechua. Alongside singing in Quechua and Spanish, she performs Andean dances, such as the Peruvian national dance La Marinera, where thudding synths and strobes accompany the traditional handkerchief swirls.
However, Renata Flores is not here merely to entertain.
It often feels like we are getting a crash course in the history of Peru, indigenous rights and the current political climate. From songs about Inca princesses (Beatriz Caya Coya) to the 2023 Juliaca massacre (La América Que Se Olvida), where 17 people, predominantly of Quechua and Aymara heritage, were killed in anti-government protests, Flores is on a mission to keep indigenous voices at the forefront of the conversation. And if the audience member comes away having learnt some new words in Quechua, all the better.
She mainly performs songs from her debut album, Isqun. Meaning ‘nine’ in Quechua, Isqun refers to the number of Inca women who inspired each song on the album. The music reflects her diverse influences – a mix of traditional Andean instruments and trap beats – although sometimes the backing track feels in competition with her soft trap vocals.
There is no doubting her passion for the cause, however, and at points she becomes emotional, such as when introducing the track Mirando la Misma Luna, about continued discrimination against the Quechua people.
“¡Vamos a seguir resistiendo en los Andes!” (“We will carry on resisting in the Andes!”), she declares, before bringing out a violinist and a dancer dressed in traditional costume for her next track: Las Tijeras.
For the final part of the show, she invites on stage the Chilean-Venezuelan band Imperio Bamba. They end on Akakaw, which was originally recorded in collaboration with the legendary Peruvian psychedelica band Los Mirlos. Alongside Flores, the six-piece band raises the energy in the room to an ecstatic finale in a celebration of South American culture and heritage.
“¡El arte es protesta!” Flores raises a fist in the air.
Even on the other side of the world, the message is loud and clear.
