THIS IS ZEY NE

Zeyne’s childhood home in Jordan was a veritable symphony of sound, the air always buzzing with music, from her mother’s lilting humming to her sister’s classical piano and her father’s eclectic collection of CDs collected from his global adventures. Her earliest memories were permeated with the gentle hum of her mother’s voice, which seemed to reverberate throughout their home, leaving a lasting imprint on her. “My mom has a beautiful voice,” Zeyne reminisces, “and she used to sing just inside the house, not anywhere else. grew up just listening to her voice. It was very special to me.” Music seemed to flow through the veins of Zeyne’s family, passed down from one generation to the next. “My mother got her voice from her mom. guess that’s where got it from.” It was her grandmother who had first passed on the gift of singing, and she traces her own musical talents through this matriarchal lineage.

Naturally, Zeyne found herself humming along, tuning in to the frequency of her own voice, discovering her own musical abilities as she went along. Steeped in this musically-charged environment, Zeyne picked up bits and pieces from her surroundings, incorporating them into her own unique palette of sounds. “My dad loved listening to all sorts of music. He traveled a lot and he would get all these CDs and tapes from the countries he was in. South African jazz and other things that you wouldn’t expect to listen to at the age of four,” she says. Her father’s penchant for international music piqued Zeyne’s curiosity, leading her to explore different musical traditions from around the world on her own. Today, she incorporates elements of Arabic music, jazz, pop and R&B into her own compositions, engineering a sound unique to her.

Born and raised in Amman, the 25-year-old artist of Palestinian origin credits her musically-inspired upbringing for shaping her into the singer and songwriter she is today. Music was woven into every part of her life, a rich tapestry of sounds and rhythms that she couldn’t help but be swept up in. It was her sister who sparked Zeyne’s inclination towards the piano. Her sister, who was professionally trained, would play the instrument with a musicality that fascinated the young Zeyne. At the tender age of three, she remembers being entranced by the way her fingers danced across the keys, the notes swelling and falling like the ebb and flow of the sea. “I was fascinated, musically, by the way she was playing the piano,” she recalls. “I looked at my mom and I was like, ‘I want to play piano.’” And so, a few years later, she began taking piano lessons herself. It was a natural fit - the instrument felt like an extension of her own body, and she poured her heart into every practice session. As she grew older, her skills only sharpened, and she found herself turning to the piano again and again as a source of comfort and inspiration.

“Now I find myself writing my songs on the piano, because it’s the instrument that feels most like home to me,” she says. And indeed, listening to her music, it’s easy to hear the gentle, soothing influence of those early piano lessons, the way the notes curl and unfurl like tendrils of smoke. The piano has become not only an instrument, but a vessel for her emotions, her thoughts, and her creativity. It was a sanctuary for her, a place where she could lose herself in the melodies that she created. Writing her songs on the piano felt like second nature to her, like coming home.

As she grew older, Zeyne’s interest in music only deepened, and she began to take formal lessons in piano and voice, which she continued for over a decade. “When I was a child, I always had this dream of going into the arts. just loved the idea of being on a theater stage and performing. I just think I never had the confidence. And so that idea was always planted inside my head. I think I just convinced myself that I couldn’t do it,” she says. Zeyne’s affinity for music had been an ever-present in her life, yet it largely remained on the periphery, in large part due to her anxiety and shy demeanor. “All my life I’ve been shy of singing in public. I’ve been taking piano lessons and vocal lessons since the age of five but never wanted to share it with anyone. It was just very personal to me.”

And so, music took a back seat as she pursued her studies in Media Communications and Sociology at Sussex University in Brighton, navigated the 9-5 grind and took on an array of internships and desk jobs over the years. As Zeyne settled into her career, she felt a gnawing sense of dissatisfaction, strains of music still hummed in the background of her mind, a persistent presence that refused to be ignored. After completing her studies, Zeyne landed a coveted job offer at a public relations firm in London. The opportunity seemed too good to pass up, offering her not only a full-time job, but also sponsorship. “At the time, was like, wow, of course, I’m gonna stay here. Of course, I’m gonna move to London,” Zeyne recalls. But life had other plans for her.

When she returned to Amman to renew her papers and travel documents, the world was hit by Covid-19, and everything came to a grinding halt. The pandemic completely derailed Zeyne’s plans and she was devastated when the lockdown in Jordan cost her the job in London she had been aiming for throughout her undergraduate.

Locked down at home with her plans for a career in PR on hold, Zeyne felt trapped and unsure of what the future held. But it was in the midst of this forced seclusion that she discovered a safe haven in music, that passion that had been simmering beneath the surface for so long.

“I was just stuck at home, stuck in quarantine. I opened this account. And I was like, you know what, I’ll just entertain myself, and I’ll entertain others as well. So I started posting covers, and slowly my account started growing,” Zeyne shared, describing the moment she started her Instagram account.

Zeyne was able to find a silver lining in the form of her newfound passion for music. She found herself spending more and more time singing, experimenting with different genres and sharing her voice with the world. Singing became a form of therapy for her, helping her navigate the uncertainty of the pandemic and find purpose in a time of upheaval.