Lovely Difficult, Paris-based Cape Verdean Mayra Andrade gets help from her friends

Singer Mayra Andrade was contributing to the rebirth of Cape Verdean music at the tender age of 20. But she’s always been more than a neotraditional singer. Now 28 and living in Paris, she releases her fourth album Lovely Difficult - sung in French, English, Portuguese and her native Criolo - tomorrow.

Mayra Andrade

Lovely Difficult features contemporary musicians like Israel's Yael Naim, France's Tété and Benjamin Biolay. The result is a rare beast indeed - a Cape Verdean pop album. “A kind of tribute to the last 11 years spent in Paris,” she says “exposed to so many different sonorities, not all related with Cape Verde.”

Andrade plays The Trianon in Paris on 13 November.