Born and raised in Staten Island, seventeen-year-old artist Shamiqua Wilson is making noise for her borough. Despite still finishing up her last year of high school, Shamiqua has managed to achieve some major milestones within her budding career as a young musician. Between getting the opportunity to provide the soundtrack for designer Ulla Johnson’s Spring/Summer 2021 runway show and the recent release of her nine-track project Dear Diary, it’s certain that this is going to be a promising year for the rising artist.

Shamiqua attributes her affinity for music to her upbringing in a church. Due to her grandma being a pastor, she and her cousins were encouraged to sing in the church’s choir. However, what kept her motivated to continue singing as she got older was having that one teacher that encouraged her to keep pursuing music and even helped set up some of her first solo performances. “She helped me develop my voice and that really helped me build confidence for the first time,” Shamiqua explains.

Though hailing from Staten Island, Shamiqua credits her temporary move to North Carolina as the beginning of her writing and putting out her own music. “That changed everything. You know how it’s really calm down South? It’s a good space for introspection, so I took a lot of time just making stuff,” reveals Shamiqua.

Earlier this March, Shamiqua dropped her self-produced project Dear Diary. The title for this project is perfectly fitting considering her genuine and honest voice that can be heard across all nine tracks. It’s almost as if Shamiqua is personally inviting listeners into her own diary.

“What made me think of the title was how whenever I’d write my songs, everything I’d write would be in one book. It was like I was writing to myself. I’m always trying to be more honest because I’m a really vague type of person. It’s not easy to put how you feel into words and even when you can put them into words, it sometimes doesn’t even feel like enough. Dear Diary was really a collection of me trying to be more specific with how I feel.”

Despite the haziness and lightness of her vocals, Shamiqua delves into heavy and pressing topics on this project. Specifically on the song “Rise” which was written with respect to George Floyd and the movement for Black lives. Shamiqua recalls being influenced by the rise in community and people coming together to protest.

“Rise is about George Floyd and about everyone sporadically coming together. And it didn’t matter your skin color or anything like that. Everyone just coming together and protesting about it. That was a hard time for me. I just felt like I couldn’t do anything. COVID was at its peak and Black lives were getting killed on the street. It was the one thing you could see when you go on social media. You could not escape seeing it. It was kind of hard to see that.”

This past year, Shamiqua was asked to provide the music for Ulla Johnson’s Spring/Summer 2021 runway show. In the campaign video, Shamiqua’s graceful voice perfectly complements Johnson’s collection as you watch the models elegantly walk around Shamiqua while she performs. “That was like one of the best experiences of my life cause that was my first time performing my own music,” Shamiqua explains.

In asking Shamiqua about her plans for the future, she says it’s hard to say considering how things can be unpredictable sometimes. She explains that her process for setting goals consists of seeing something she wants to do and then working on figuring out the next course of action for attaining that goal. Though this past year has definitely proven that not everything is foreseeable, we’re excited to see what Shamiqua has next in store for her listeners in the near future.

Shamiqua Talks ‘Dear Diary’