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Coldplay welcome Palestinian-Chilean singer Elyanna to the stage during their historic headline show at Glastonbury 2024.
The British band, fronted by Chris Martin, performed at the Pyramid Stage on Saturday (June 29), one night after Dua Lipa wowed the crowd with her headlining Very impressed, despite the sound issues with the BBC broadcast.
Their fifth Glastonbury headline slot on Saturday (June 29) independent Dubbed a “once-in-a-lifetime spectacle”, the band became the most headline-grabbing band and were joined by a number of guests including Little Simz, Laura Mvula and back to the Future Starring Michael J. Fox.
A long-time vocalist who has joined Martin and his bandmates is Elyanna, an experimental pop star known for fusing Arabic music with Latin rhythms.
Elyanna performed Coldplay’s 2019 song “Arabesque” alongside Femi Kuti, as well as “We Pray,” a new collaboration between the band, Little Simz and Burna Boy.
The 22-year-old singer, who became famous at the age of 15, is the daughter of a Palestinian poet. Her father is a Palestinian poet and singer, and her mother is a pianist from Chile.
Elyanna moved to San Diego, California in 2017 to pursue her music career and became famous for posting covers on her Instagram page. She was eventually discovered by Grammy Award winner Nasri Atwi.
The singer recently performed to a sold-out show at London’s KOKO Hall, signed with Universal Arabic Music, and made history by becoming the first artist to sing in Arabic at KOKO Hall. The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. She wore a Palestinian headscarf while doing so.
In 2023, Elyanna released a song dedicated to Palestine called “Olive Branch”. She first shared the track on Instagram, captioning it: “I’ve been struggling to put my emotions into words over the past few days. It hurts me to witness what happened and I’m worried, I am praying for my family, friends and people back home.
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Towards the end of Coldplay’s headline set, Chris Martin called for unity during “what is seen as a very divisive time on this planet.”
“Thank you for restoring our faith and my faith that most people can come together peacefully with different flags, different colors, different genders, sexual orientations, ages, everything,” he told the crowd. Singing and having a good time and ice cream, no fighting or anything like that.
“So thank you for inspiring us and hopefully we can send this together around the world as a beacon of unity in a time where it seems impossible and you just proved it’s not possible so that’s awesome Yes, thank you.
