Layla Kaylif

Layla Kaylif

Layla Kaylif

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Layla Kaylif

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For Layla Kaylif, a song can be more than a melody or a story. It can become a meeting point between cultures, literary traditions and ways of understanding love. On “Walks on Water,” her second single from an upcoming album, the Anglo-Arab singer-songwriter brings that idea to life through a cinematic duet with South-East London alt-R&B artist ISRA3L.

Following “Black Is The Colour (Of My True Love’s Hair),” Kaylif continues to explore how familiar literary and musical traditions can be reshaped into something personal. This time, she draws inspiration from the poetry of celebrated Syrian writer Nizar Qabbani, taking fragments and imagery from his work and weaving them together with her own lyrics. The result moves between physical desire and something more spiritual, treating intimacy as both a human experience and a form of devotion.

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Layla Kaylif

Layla Kaylif

Layla Kaylif

The song’s evolution also reflects Kaylif’s collaborative approach. Nashville-based musician Reed Pittman reinterpreted her original melody through a male vocal phrasing that shifted the emphasis of certain words. That unexpected interpretation helped shape the track into a duet, with ISRA3L taking the lead while Kaylif’s harmonies move around his voice. Produced by Jay Jacobs, “Walks on Water” finds its identity in the exchange between different voices, perspectives and musical sensibilities.

This dialogue between traditions has been central to Kaylif’s work for years. Educated in Arabic literature at Oxford, she has built a distinctive songwriting practice around the relationship between Arabic and Western literary cultures. Rather than treating poetry as something distant from contemporary music, she brings its imagery and emotional complexity into songs shaped by folk, alternative and cinematic influences.

Her reputation as a “Pop Poet” began to take shape with “Shakespeare in Love,” which was selected as a BBC Radio Record of the Week and went on to chart across Southeast Asia. Since then, her music has reached listeners in 169 countries, accumulating more than 15 million streams worldwide. Her 2020 album Lovers Don’t Meet further explored the emotional worlds of love, longing and cultural identity, drawing on literary influences including Qabbani and Rumi.

More recently, Kaylif has continued to move between established musical forms and personal reinvention. Her 2026 album Call of the Yoni received support from college and specialty radio across North America, while “Black Is The Colour” offered a fresh interpretation of a traditional folk ballad, incorporating her own lyrics into a song with a long history.

“Walks on Water” extends that creative conversation. Through Qabbani’s poetry, Kaylif explores the space where desire begins to resemble devotion, while the interplay between her voice and ISRA3L’s gives the song an intimate, almost cinematic quality. It is a meeting of literary heritage and contemporary expression, shaped not by the need to choose between cultures, but by the possibilities that emerge when they speak to each other.

As Kaylif puts it, she enjoys bringing the richness of cultural conversations into her music, allowing something from one tradition to speak to another. On “Walks on Water,” that exchange becomes the heart of the song.

The song’s evolution also reflects Kaylif’s collaborative approach. Nashville-based musician Reed Pittman reinterpreted her original melody through a male vocal phrasing that shifted the emphasis of certain words. That unexpected interpretation helped shape the track into a duet, with ISRA3L taking the lead while Kaylif’s harmonies move around his voice. Produced by Jay Jacobs, “Walks on Water” finds its identity in the exchange between different voices, perspectives and musical sensibilities.

This dialogue between traditions has been central to Kaylif’s work for years. Educated in Arabic literature at Oxford, she has built a distinctive songwriting practice around the relationship between Arabic and Western literary cultures. Rather than treating poetry as something distant from contemporary music, she brings its imagery and emotional complexity into songs shaped by folk, alternative and cinematic influences.

Her reputation as a “Pop Poet” began to take shape with “Shakespeare in Love,” which was selected as a BBC Radio Record of the Week and went on to chart across Southeast Asia. Since then, her music has reached listeners in 169 countries, accumulating more than 15 million streams worldwide. Her 2020 album Lovers Don’t Meet further explored the emotional worlds of love, longing and cultural identity, drawing on literary influences including Qabbani and Rumi.

More recently, Kaylif has continued to move between established musical forms and personal reinvention. Her 2026 album Call of the Yoni received support from college and specialty radio across North America, while “Black Is The Colour” offered a fresh interpretation of a traditional folk ballad, incorporating her own lyrics into a song with a long history.

“Walks on Water” extends that creative conversation. Through Qabbani’s poetry, Kaylif explores the space where desire begins to resemble devotion, while the interplay between her voice and ISRA3L’s gives the song an intimate, almost cinematic quality. It is a meeting of literary heritage and contemporary expression, shaped not by the need to choose between cultures, but by the possibilities that emerge when they speak to each other.

As Kaylif puts it, she enjoys bringing the richness of cultural conversations into her music, allowing something from one tradition to speak to another. On “Walks on Water,” that exchange becomes the heart of the song.

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