Jasur Gaipov is a young Uzbek pop singer. He sings mainly in Uzbek, but he knows several other languages—Russian, English, Turkish, and Azerbaijani, and Tadjik. In addition to singing, he writes poetry, dances, and acts in films, and has trained as a lawyer and worked as an entrepreneur. He has said that his biggest musical influence […]

Nursultan Azykbaev (Нурсултан Азыкбаев) is a Kyrgyz pop singer who has extremely recently come to the forefront of the Kyrgyz pop scene. He sings in Kyrgyz, Russian, and English. Azykbaev, only 21 years old, is currently studying flute performance at the Kyrgyz State Music Academy—he is in his third year. Azykbaev made waves recently when […]

Ilyaz Abdrazakov (Ильяз Абдразаков) is a contemporary Kyrgyz rock/pop singer. He is ethnically also part Kazakh, but sings mostly in Kyrgyz. Unusual among the small crowd of contemporary Kyrgyz singers, he uses harder rock instrumentation and sometimes electronica in his music, and while his voice is part of the current tradition of smooth, easy-to-listen-to voices, […]

Bayastan Botokanov (Баястан Ботоканов; he also sometimes goes by the moniker Ortoasiabayastan, Ортоазиябаястан) is a Kyrgyz rapper. He’s young—born in 1993—but not new to Bishkek rap. While there isn’t a ton of information floating around about him yet, he’s definitely someone to watch out for on the Bishkek music scene. Many of his songs are […]