Sabina Ddumba

Sweden's Sabina Ddumba brings a soulful vocal style shaped by gospel yet directed toward modern pop and R&B. Emerging during the 2010s, she placed the platinum-certified tracks "Scarred for Life" and "Effortless" on her debut album, the 2016 Top Ten success Homeward Bound. After joining the cast of the Swedish reality series Så Mycket Bättre, she maintained a consistent output of singles that preceded her third full-length, 2021's The Forgotten Ones.

Ddumba entered the world in 1994 in Fisksätra, a Stockholm suburb, inside a religious household whose parents had relocated to Sweden from Uganda. Some of her first encounters with music came from listening to her mother perform Ugandan nursery rhymes. During adolescence she spent six years as a member of the Tensta Gospel Choir. At the same time she absorbed a blend of current and 1990s R&B, with The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill proving especially formative. In 2012 she made a short-lived appearance on the Swedish edition of The X Factor and recorded her first professional vocal on Adam Kanyama's "The Golden Child." The next year she added backing vocals to Katy Perry's Prism single "Walking on Air."

Ddumba issued her opening solo release, "Scarred for Life," in 2014, an effort that secured a deal with Warner Music. The following year brought "Effortless" and the platinum-certified "Not Too Young," along with a performance slot at the Swedish Grammy Awards. In 2016 she unveiled the Wolf Cousins-produced "Not Too Young, Pt. 2" and the full-length Homeward Bound, which reached number ten on the Swedish charts. Her participation alongside Icona Pop and others in the eighth season of Så Mycket Bättre resulted in the 2017 collection Så Mycket Bättre 2017: Tolkningarna, which climbed into the Top 40; her reading of Uno Svenningsson's "Vågorna" separately reached the Top 20. She continued with the 2018 single "Small World" and the 2019 collaboration "Blow My Mind" featuring Mr. Eazi. Further singles carried her forward until the arrival of The Forgotten Ones in 2021.