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Long before Spotify playlists and TikTok algorithms, reservation radio stations were doing the hard work of keeping Indigenous music alive and putting it in front of young ears who needed to hear it. For a generation of Native artists now making noise on a national stage, those crackly FM signals were the beginning of everything.
Across the United States, a growing number of Native musicians are releasing music entirely in their ancestral languages — not as a niche experiment, but as a deliberate act of cultural survival. From Navajo-language rap to Ojibwe lullabies finding audiences on Spotify, these artists are proving that a song can be a lifeline. This is your guide to listening in.
From Lakota hip-hop to Diné electronic soundscapes, these seven Native composers and producers aren't waiting for a seat at the table — they're building their own. Here's your essential introduction to the Indigenous artists reshaping American sound from the ground up, with exactly where to start listening.