Butterfly - Single

Butterfly - Single

Singer, songwriter, and producer Amaarae first learned about Juneteenth as a child in Atlanta having just emigrated from Accra, Ghana. “I was in third grade and it was a part of our Black history lesson,” she says. “There is a bittersweet feeling that comes with the holiday, knowing that human beings with lives, rights, and families should not have endured this sort of torture to begin with. There is also some joy in their hope and their perseverance to not be defined by the pain.” For Apple Music’s Juneteenth-inspired Freedom Songs collection of covers and originals, Amaarae chose to cover Herbie Hancock’s “Butterfly,” a song written by the jazz great’s sister Jean Hancock. “It’s about the sweetness of freedom and the power of transformation and growth,” Amaarae says. “This symbolizes both the plight and pleasure of the Black experience.”

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