Aïcha, carrying a vivid yellow T-shirt and blue skirt, appeared on the DJ, Dominique Leosgo, smiled and closed her eyes. Then, because the music pulsed, she shook her shoulders, quicker and quicker. The shimmy would go world.
Clips of her dancing, which Leosgo posted on his TikTok web page, collectively obtained greater than 8 million views, turning the pair right into a sensation of their West African nation and past. Aïcha and Leosgo, who goes by DJ Domi, made a music video that obtained greater than 11 million views in 4 months, making it among the many nation’s greatest current hits. They’ve traveled to Chad, Ivory Coast and France and been interviewed with diplomats and journalists. Their second music video, produced by one among Burkina Faso’s prime administrators, was launched this month.
Within the once-peaceful nation of Burkina Faso, which has in recent times been besieged by Islamist extremist teams, the pair has change into a logo of resilience and hope. Leosgo and Aïcha — who has no coaching as a dancer, by no means went to high school and says that she “by no means, ever anticipated any of this” — say they’re an instance of the folks’s willpower to maintain having fun with life, regardless of the violence.
Throughout a current week within the capital, Ouagadougou, audio system at a government-sponsored panel on the function of media praised {the teenager}, boys on bikes chased after her automobile, and women and men burst into dance when the tune began enjoying at a fuel station.
“We don’t wish to lecture however to carry pleasure,” Leosgo stated in an interview. “To assist folks to overlook.”
“Hand in hand, we’ll get by this,” Aïcha added. “I’m certain.”
Leosgo, 33, made a reputation for himself touring the nation acting at “bals poussières,” or actually, “mud exhibits,” a convention wherein artists arrive in often-remote villages with solely their automobiles and their sound techniques.
Regardless of the rising militant violence, Leosgo saved performing, attracting enthusiastic crowds at performances with “no dance flooring and no fairly lights.”
On the evening Leosgo met Aïcha, he was performing within the village of Sin. Two of Aïcha’s mates, Yacouba and Adama, had paid Leosgo for “atalakou” wherein folks pay artists to make songs about them. That evening, the DJ was singing their names when he seen Aïcha in her vivid yellow outfit, shaking her shoulders. The transfer is conventional, he stated, however he’d by no means seen somebody use it fairly like that in response to his music.
“Who’s that woman?” he recalled asking her mates.
“That’s Aïcha,” they responded.
And so the chorus was born: “Yacouba, Adama, Yacouba, Adama … Aïcha, tremblé!”
The clip solely went viral months later. Aïcha realized about it when a pal visited her within the peanut discipline to point out her the variety of viewers.
Aïcha’s speedy response, she recalled with fun throughout an interview, was worry. “I went dwelling and shaved my head,” she stated. “I didn’t need folks to acknowledge me.”
However when Leosgo and his supervisor returned to the village to seek out Aïcha, she was on board for the music video, and for no matter got here subsequent. Folks within the village used to inform her she was a humorous dancer, Aïcha stated. “However I all the time felt relaxed after I danced,” she stated. “So I saved dancing.”
On a current night at one of many metropolis’s fancy accommodations, Aïcha and Leosgo had been facet by facet, cracking jokes and dancing. In contrast to that evening within the village, they had been now on an elevated stage, surrounded by huge lights and palm bushes, with dozens of employed dancers following their actions.
They’d gotten again from a visit to France a few week earlier than and had been filming their second music video. Within the six months because the video had gone viral, Aïcha had made her first journey to Ouagadougou, the capital, then moved there. She’d traveled internationally for the primary time. She’d began studying French and taking dance programs. She’d gotten a full wardrobe improve.
She nonetheless stayed in contact along with her mates from the village, together with Yacouba and Adama. She nonetheless preferred the identical meals. And she nonetheless couldn’t fairly imagine how she’d ended up right here.
“For now I wish to preserve dancing,” she stated, sitting close to Leosgo and the remainder of her staff, who she stated had change into like an adopted household. “However day by day has its finish. And if God needs me to do one thing else, then I’ll.”
David Armel, who directed the second music video, stated their story had resonated a lot partially due to how humble the pair has remained.
“When folks see her, they don’t see a rustic or an ethnicity,” he stated. “When folks see her, they only see a Black woman dancing, having fun with herself after an extended day of labor. And everybody pertains to her.”
Onstage, Aïcha wore the identical shade of blue and yellow as earlier than, however her worn T-shirt and skirt had been changed by a handy guide a rough blue vest and pants and a vivid yellow undershirt. She smiled broadly, seeming relaxed.
“Transfer, dance, transfer, dance,” Leosgo sang, because the dancers beneath adopted.
Everybody was shimmying their shoulders, however nobody fairly as quick as Aïcha.