Naja P talks modern sounds and traditional Greenlandic music

Naja P says she didn’t appreciate the musical potential of her Inuit culture and language until she started making music as a young adult.

Now, the 26-year-old singer-songwriter, born and raised in Nuuk, Greenland, will entertain crowds at the Alianait Arts Festival with music she’s written in the Kalaallisut dialect of Inuktut.

“I’m so excited,” Naja said in an interview. “I love being at the stage and giving something for the people and also getting something in return. That’s so powerful, especially with my band I feel the force and power is higher than when I perform alone.”

Naja will be backed by a band that includes Jaaku Soerensen on guitar, Qillaq Petrussen on bass, Jens-Christian (Jaqqi) Lyberth-Lennert on drums, and Laura Lennert Jensen on keyboard.

Performing for other Inuit is important to Naja, she said, because when she was younger she was not fully aware of the extent to which Inuit inhabit the circumpolar world, and she had not yet fully embraced her identity as an Inuk.

“Being a teenager, it’s like you just want to fit in society,” she said.

“We listened a lot to Danish music, and we spoke only Danish. We didn’t think about who we actually are. Then in 2019 I went into music and realized how great musicians are here in Kalaalliit Nunaat. All those lyrics made by my fellow Inuit were genius.”

As a mother to a one-year-old daughter, Naja said she wants to instill in her child the pride in her Inuit identity that Naja eventually learned to feel. Naja’s mother didn’t raise her with a qilaat (traditional drum) at home, she said, but she plays one onstage now, and she gave her own daughter a drum for her first birthday.

“I really want her to be proud of who she is,” Naja said. “And to know her history, so she doesn’t ever feel that she is unimportant in this world.”

That sentiment extends beyond Naja’s family, to Inuit across the North. At age 11, she was a cast member on Pikkorissuaqqat, a Greenlandic children’s program, and she has been performing identity-affirming music for seven years.

“The audience will get some, maybe, anger out from my music, and also pride of being Inuk.” she said. “I imagine a future where all of Inuit Nunangat is one government. That’s my dream because I know that would heal a lot of our wounds, if we connected that way, in a deeper way.”

Naja’s dream of Inuit uniting across the North might one day parallel the dream she followed, where she found connections and a place to fit in by pursuing music.

“It was the first time I was in a group where we could understand each other,” she remembered. “I was not the weird kid anymore. I was a part of something.”

The 2026 Alianait Arts Festival runs from June 18 to 21 in Iqaluit.