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Joan Armatrading, Camfed International Board Member

For more than 30 years, Joan Armatrading has written and recorded songs with some of the finest musicians in the world. Born in the West Indies and raised in Birmingham, England, Joan released her debut album in the early 1970s and scored hits with classic songs like Drop the Pilot and Me Myself I.

Joan played for Nelson Mandela on his 70th birthday in 1999 and was asked to write a tribute song for the former president of South Africa. She was nominated twice as Best Female Vocalist for the Brit Awards and for the American Grammy Awards. In 1996, she received the Ivor Novello Award for Outstanding Contemporary Song Collection and has numerous platinum, silver and gold albums to her name. Joan was nominated as one of the 100 most influential women in rock in a 1999 VH1 poll.

Joan is also a trustee of the Open University and was elected President of Women of the Year in the United Kingdom in 2005 for a term of five years.