Hillzy Featured by The BBC and DJ Edu
Hillzy on the BBC Africa homepage
Hillzy is starting his 2023 with the same amount of momentum and media attention as he finished off the last year! The Nharo hitmaker who is still riding the wave of his popular EP release In The Building is now catching the attention of a number of media platforms and artists alike. That attention has culminated in 2 massive features by The British Broadcast Corporation (BBC).
Hillzy was featured on BBC’s This Is Africa Radio show on January 27 as well as an interview with the Afroboss himself DJ Edu that appeared on the BBC Africa website’s homepage.
This feature caps off a massive week for Hillzy in which a clip of Hillzy performing Nharo at Zimbabwe’s biggest festival (Fiesta Fiesta) to an ecstatic crowd went viral on social media. The clip was reposted by Mr Eazi on his Instagram page as well as countless media pages including Chop Daily - a UK-based Afrobeats page with 1.4 million followers. Nharo and the IN The Building have also returned to the top of the Audiomark streaming charts.
Hillzy performing Nharo at Fiesta reposted by Mr. Eazi
Hillzy’s Nharo is at the No.1 Hip Hop Song in Zimbabwe on Audiomack as of January 29, 2023
Hillzy’s IN The Building is at the No.1 Hip Hop album in Zimbabwe on Audiomack as of January 29, 2023
BBC Interview
Hilary Ngaakudzwe Chipunza, better known as Hillzy, is an R&B and hip hop artist from Zimbabwe with a silky smooth voice.
He has a very international sound to his music. So much so that it took him a while to be recognised as a Zimbabwean artist despite the fact that he sings in both English and Shona.
"When I actually started out, the comments I would get were like: 'Wow, yeah you don't sound like you are based in Zim.'"
He puts this down to his musical influences which include the Grammy-award winning US singer-songwriter Chris Brown, and other Western music.
"So because of that I always try and add my African flavour to it. As time went on I decided to mix the two and just make sure it sounds nice. So now the recognition is coming all because I'm adding more Shona elements into the music, and it has definitely done wonders for me."
While Hillzy studied computer science and computer engineering at the University of Cape Town, in South Africa, he was also honing his skills as a beats maker and started recording his own material.
He says social media has been key to building his career. But being in Cape Town, he found it difficult to connect with Zimbabweans initially.
"So that's how social media built up for me because it was a way to connect with Zim. But then I learnt so much about it and I was like, 'hey why not target people in Cape Town, Johannesberg, Nigeria, to the rest of the world'?"
Hillzy released his latest EP last October, entitled In The Building. It's a mixture of R&B, hip hop and some songs with an Afrobeats vibe. But he insists he wants to stick with his first loves, R&B and hip hop.
"I recently did an Afrobeats song, Chargie, which did very well, and I do see the potential in it, but I just feel like I've already started this R&B and hip hop journey. I would love to collaborate with other artists. I just genuinely think I'd be a better 'feature' than an Afrobeats artist."
Hillzy says that wanting to be known internationally, and at the same time wanting the respect within Zimbabwe, presents him with a difficult musical balance to strike.
One of his most successful songs is Ndiwe Wega Uripo which means You Are The Only One Here. On it, he samples Zimbabwean legend Oliver Mtukudzi who wrote the song for his wife Daisy.
"People are kind of saying, 'OK I hear a little bit of some Mtukudzi here, who is this kid?' So I have a lot of elderly fans all because of just that song. I think I'm also on that kind of mission where I'm trying to bring back that old school of Zimbabwean music, so you can expect something like that in the near future."
Hillzy says his focus this year is to become part of the African roster.
"Say you're in London - when people ask you about African music you're probably going to say 'there's your WizKid, there's Tems, Nasty C'. I want people to also say there's Hillzy."
He also wants to enter into some collaborations.
"If Mr Eazi wants to do a song I want to fly to Nigeria and do a song with him. I want to be more on the road and less online. That's the next thing for me. The African roster."
To hear the full interview with Hillzy, listen to This is Africa on BBC World Service radio and partner stations across Africa, and online here: bbcworldservice.com/thisisafrica.
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About Hillzy
Hillzy (born Hilary Chipunza) is one of Zimbabwe’s most promising and exciting upcoming Contemporary Urban Music acts who has already built a dedicated following across the globe using his unique voice, poignant lyrics and captivating vulnerability.
Hillzy’s music straddles the fine line between Hip Hop’s brazen braggadocio and R&B’s melancholy melodies. He first broke onto the scene with his T.U.T.OR. Mixtape that featured a blend of uptempo Hip Hop tracks with Hillzy’s long-time collaborator H3nry. Aptly titled, the project was released while both artists were still studying at the University of Cape Town. It was at UCT where Hillzy developed his skills as a producer, engineer and multi-genre artist.
During this time, Hillzy managed to build his following and secured collaborations with Cassper Nyovest and Jeremy Loops. He also had appearances on SABC 3’s Morning Expresso and SABC 2’s Hectic 9. Collaborations with Huawei, Castle Lite and Uber soon followed.
In 2017 Hillzy had a breakout year when he released Muroora - an impassioned and stripped-down love ballad that dominated radio and streaming platforms. To date, the song is known as one of Zimbabwe’s quintessential wedding songs. In the same year, he won the Best Diaspora Award at the Zimbabwean Hip Hop Awards, secured an Adidas brand deal, and was named one of Hype Magazine’s Freshmen of The Year.
Hillzy then returned to Zimbabwe where he undertook the most daring campus tour since the early 2000s. The Legacy Tour featured Hillzy and Garry Mapanzure as the only billed headliners who performed at sold-out shows across every major university and college in Zimbabwe in the summer of 2019. The tour is still regarded as one of the most successful tours in the country.
More success followed as Hillzy caught the eye of Afrobeats superstar and mogul - Mr Eazi. Hillzy then collaborated with Mr Eazi on You Are Enough which was released via Mr Eazi’s Empawa label.
After that Hillzy’s work and accolades got the attention of American superstar producer and engineer - Dakari (G-Eazy, Halsey, Charlie Puth, E-40). Dakari signed Hillzy to his Cider Music imprint and the two then began work on Hillzy’s critically and commercially acclaimed Chisikana EP. The project featured chart-topping collaborations with Sha Sha, Gemma Griffiths and Garry Mapanzure.
As a talented vocalist Hillzy is also widely known for his song covers which have generated a great deal of interest in their own right. His cover for Big Sean’s Jumping Out The Window was featured in the 2017 MTV Music Video Awards telecast, and his covers have received stamps of approval from artists like Kehlani and P. Diddy himself.
After the success of Chisikana, Hillzy branched out to found his own imprint, Masinh Productions - a portmanteau of Massive In House Productions and a play on words of the word’s Shona slang homonym (ma-scene)
In 2022 Hillzy and Masinh Productions partnered with Point Black Entertainment to further his career and release his upcoming EP - In The Building.