When your breakout album deals with familial death in a largely non-Western musical style, your press cycle is bound to be… er, interesting. Arooj Aftab's certainly has been. As per the grief element — her 2021 album, Vulture Prince, is dedicated to her late brother — she's dealt with interviewers both compassionate and rude.

"There was a live radio interview where the interviewer was just like, 'How did he die?' And I was like, 'Oh my god. What the f***?'" Aftab recalls to GRAMMY.com. "That's not cool, and I feel like people should know that. But people don't know s***. There's a very 'getting the story' kind of attitude, which leaves you in a place that's very devoid of grace or care."

Then, there's the music itself — an enchanting and therapeutic intertwining of post-minimalism, chamber music and folk idioms, with some words drawn from Asian poets like Rumi, Mirza Ghalib and Hafeez Hoshiarpur. For overworked music writers, the complex nature of Aftab’s sourcing presents all kinds of opportunities for faceplants.

"It's very difficult to do this, it has taken a lot of time and energy as a musician, so it's not a f***ing cover," she told Pitchfork in 2021, referring to indelicate and/or inaccurate characterizations of her work. "I'm taking something that's really old and pulling it into the now."

Read More: Meet This Year's Best New Artist Nominees | 2022 GRAMMYs Awards Show

The craft and care she put into Vulture Prince paid off in ways she could have never suspected: For one, Aftab is nominated for Best New Artist and Best Global Music Performance ("Mohabbat") at the 2022 GRAMMY Awards show on April 3.

And while the intense attention has been somewhat challenging for the Pakistan-raised, Brooklyn-based artist, she's gratified that a light is being shone on her musical community.

Read on for an in-depth interview with Aftab about the multiplicity of Pakistani musics, the healing essence of her work, and why we should listen and write about music in a more nuanced way.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. 

I imagine this press cycle is a deluge — it dwarfs those of past years. 

It's been like this all year, which is a good problem to have. It's been kind of insane since the album came out, so by now, I'm so press-ready.

Is being a "different" kind of GRAMMY nominee a double-edged sword? Is there a potential to feel otherized?

This nomination for Best New Artist has made me feel very validated. I feel like people in post-minimalist or classical or jazz circles have been a little bit otherized by the GRAMMYs, which has always kind of nodded toward the mainstream, mostly — that whole listening audience. Being nominated as Best New Artist has shattered that — for me, at least — and I don't feel otherized anymore.

I feel like I'm next to these artists that are listened to quite widely — and rightfully so. But there are also a whole lot of people who listen to our style of music, so that's good.

Do you feel like it's a net positive — as though this exposure might get new people to go check out Vijay Iyer and the rest?

I just feel like there are so many people who check him out. It's competitive, and I feel like that representation isn't often there.

That said, what people might miss is that you're actually a big fan of pop music.

[Laughs.] Yeah, true.

Is there a certain artfulness in making something that appeals to as many people as humanly possible?

There is, yeah. There absolutely has to be. Pop is very intelligent, but it's also historically been very formulaic, and some people don't like it. But I think there's always a meeting in the middle of sorts that can happen, right?

What are you checking out from that sphere?

I used to work at Genius up until [last fall], so I was very, very in the know all the time. And now, I don't know anything! I'm like, "Who are the new TikTok rappers? No idea!"

I like Mariah the Scientist; I like Saweetie. I'm digging Alicia Keys' record that just came out. It's so good. It's like, "Thank god!" I haven't heard something that isn't a jingle from her in a while. It's like old Alicia, and it's super nice.

Grief plays a big role in Vulture Prince. Is it irritating or healing having to revisit traumatic events over and over in interviews with strangers?

It's good and bad because it's kind of cathartic. When you're forced to talk about things repeatedly, then you force yourself to process them more. 

But in the journalism world, there are so many different types. People are so rude, and then other people are really sensitive, you know what I mean? Being up and down on that spectrum this year with so much press around Vulture Prince has been a little bit challenging, but hopefully, I've been very graceful and very patient and very good. I think. [Laughs.]

What did people say that was rude?

There was a live radio interview where the interviewer was just like [Blithely] "How did he die?" And I was like, "Oh my god. What the f***?" That's not cool, and I feel like people should know that. But people don't know s***. There's a very "getting the story" kind of attitude, which leaves you in a place that's very devoid of grace or care.

Then, I imagine there are people who get you to open up, and then they act like they're your best friend.

Yeah, I appreciate that more, I feel, than the sort of blunt behavior.

I do some writing for MusiCares, so I'm preoccupied with how music can or can't help in a pragmatic sense. What's your take on all that?

I think music is very, very powerful in the sense that a lot of musicians started playing or exploring music to kind of self-help.

Even when you're a teen and listening to death metal, it's already all there. It's saved a lot of lives and helped carry a lot of emotions through. So, it does predominantly serve that purpose, I think. 

If you're a listener or creator of music, I think the underlying factor there is definitely the theme of healing. Or, if not healing, then processing. Music can really pull on whatever emotional string you're flowing with at the time.

Remember that Billie Holiday song "Gloomy Sunday," where they had to go back in and write in a hopeful last versebecause too many people were committing suicide to it the way it was? That s*** was wild. In the last verse, where she's like "I was only dreaming!" — they went back and wrote that because otherwise, it was too gloomy, I guess.

I'm interested in how certain languages can channel emotions others can't. What do you feel you can communicate with Urdu? 

I think a lot of the time, yes — the language itself is one, but also the syllables and vowels and stuff for vocalists is quite a geeky thing we consider. And that's what also stretches the musicality of your singing.

Portuguese is one of those languages that really sounds good to music, to me, because it already has that rhythmic and sing-songy vibe. But Urdu as a language is deeply poetic and has a lot of analogies. Things are said directly, but very indirectly, also, with beautiful references to things.

It's inherently poetic, and that's really fun for me, because I don't like to have a lot of lyrics. I don't like to have a lot of verses. I like a simple, minimalist approach to even words and the delivery of lines. I don't like showing off a lot of vocal agility or whatever. I enjoy a post-minimal space with vocals and music itself, and for them all to come together.

Urdu can say a lot without saying too much, and that's why I like it.

Another interview with you I read that cracked me up — regarding turning poetry into music — was along the lines of "I'm not doing f***ing cover songs!"

I think it's changing now because I do yell at people quite often. I would like people to stop thinking so bluntly about music in this very black-or-white way. I encourage deeper listening of people, and that's where that falls.

These aren't renditions. These aren't covers. If you actually look at the music, the music that's surrounding this poetry hasn't existed before in any version or in anyone else's attempt of it. It strays a lot from the melodic compositions that anyone's made.

Just because the name's the same and you recognize the poetry doesn't mean that they have a strong kinship to what came before it. It has a lot of respect for those who came before those things and a lot of respect for the tradition it originates from, but it's not the same thing.

Can you talk about ghazals a bit? The same article defined it as an "art form [that] meditates on the intense longing caused by separation from God."

It's kind of hard to describe exactly what a ghazal is, because not a lot of people have thought about it. It's not really written or defined on the internet or in literature. It's very open in that sense — or, that's what I've seen from not really having studied Pakistani or South Asian classical music, so I don't really know.

I think a ghazal is actually the style in which a song is performed rather than its lyrical content. To me, a ghazal is a ballad, like "This song has been performed in the style of a ballad." And then, usually, what you're singing about is about love, breakups, loss, departure, or waiting for your lover — et cetera, et cetera. That's what my understanding is of that style in its entirety.

So it's not necessarily spiritual in intent?

It doesn't have to be. It's never explicitly said. To a regular person, it sounds like it's just about love and waiting for love, or this departure of a lover. I guess in more Muslim-leaning cultures, it takes on a spiritual connotation — it can very easily go that way.

The majority of Western listeners probably aren't familiar with the multiplicity of Pakistani musical forms. For someone in good faith who wants to learn about it, is there a way to summarize it and put yourself on the map with a "You are here" sticker?

There's super-traditional Hindustani classical… there's so much, it's insane. It's so hard. There's Northern classical music, and then there's all this folk music from different regions of the country. Then, there are these semi-classical categories, which are, like, ghazal, and maybe Thumri, which is a more free style that complements a certain dance form. 

And of course, with all these different forms, there is poetry that complements each one. So, it's kind of vast in that way. But, you know, it's all modal, and modal shares a lot with jazz.

If you think about that connection and then think of a post-jazz, post-modern, very post-everything, almost chamber, highly experimental but structured formation, with a lot of influence of American guitar folk like James Taylor or Crosby, Stills and Nash — if you add Terry Riley, or an American minimalist piano composer like John Cage or Julius Eastman — if you start entering that realm while thinking of modal music, then you land somewhere here where I am.

I also really enjoy and have an ear toward what's happening harmonically with pop structures. And then, here we are.

How did your background as a jazz student inform how your music comes out?

I didn't really study anything else, so my core is all jazz.

Really! How did you connect those poles?

I was like, "I have to go to Berklee. I'm going." And when you go to Berklee, you come out a jazz musician. That's just what happens!

How are you feeling with the GRAMMYs coming up? Is it a little surreal? 

It's all crazy. Is this what you guys do? Let everybody know a month and a half in advance, and then it's a madhouse? All the stylists, everyone's just crazy around this week that's about to happen so soon!

It's really surreal. I'm over the moon but also mortified. [Laughs.] It's very scary, but also very exciting. I'll cross my fingers and feel very grateful, keep doing what I'm doing and see what happens.

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