Lor & Laura Robles (Co-Creation-Residency Accra – Berlin)

Two musicians, one collaboration: The Co-Creation Residency Accra – Berlin enables artistic collaboration and transcultural dialogue across nearly 8,000 kilometres and two continents. A cooperation with Musicboard Berlin, Black Girls Glow and the ZK/U – Centre for Art and Urbanistics.
As part of the residency, one musician based in Berlin and one international artist come together to create a joint production. This takes place both during the Berlin-based artist’s stay in Accra and the international artist’s stay in Berlin. The outcome of their collaboration will be presented live for the first time at Pop-Kultur – a project by Musicboard Berlin.

Cameroonian rapper, singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and visual artist Lor – born Laetitia Laure Nsoutou – places feminist and activist themes at the heart of her work, including mental health, gender-based violence, and women’s rights. Musically, she draws on influences like Richard Bona and Erykah Badu, blending hip-hop, Afro-soul, and R&B with Cameroonian rhythms such as Makossa, Bend-Skin, and Bikutsi. Her debut EP »DAWN« (2020) stands for radical honesty, while »THOUGHTS AT 3« (2024) addresses mental health through diary-style storytelling. As a Dalai Lama Fellow 2023 and Black Girls Glow programme fellow (2022/23), Lor combines artistic creation with social commitment – advocating for empowerment, visibility, and social change.

Laura Robles is one of those artists whose biography is as fluid as her music. Born in Swaziland, raised in Lima, and based in Berlin since 2012, she moves between worlds – geographically and musically. An improviser, composer, and multi-instrumentalist, Robles is considered one of the world’s leading cajón players. For years, she has been deconstructing and reimagining Afro-Peruvian rhythms – not as folkloric artefacts, but through a radical lens that opens them up to jazz, noise, electronics, and European avant-garde. With projects like Camina, Tripas, Perfektomat, and Antigroove, her focus is never on reproduction, but on transformation. She is currently exploring the idea of a »German groove« in contemporary jazz – driven by the same curiosity that has always led her to question and expand musical traditions.