Canadian singer Nelly Furtado has announced that she will be taking a break from performing to focus on other creative and personal pursuits.
In a statement shared on social media on Friday, October 24, the Maneater hitmaker said she is stepping away from the stage “for the foreseeable future” to “pursue some other creative and personal endeavours that I feel would better suit this next phase of my life.”
The 46-year-old singer marked the announcement with a nostalgic two-photo carousel — the first showing her at 20 years old before her debut performance at Lilith Fair, and the second capturing her onstage in Berlin this past summer as the crowd cheered her name.
Reflecting on her journey, Furtado recalled buying a pink dress and sparkly platform shoes for that first show. “It was so meaningful and my artist self felt so actualized,” she wrote.
Celebrating 25 years since her debut album Whoa, Nelly! was released, Furtado expressed joy that her music continues to resonate with a new generation. “My music has reached a whole new generation of fans and I couldn’t be happier about that,” she said.
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“When my album debuted, my biggest wish was hoping some kid would dust off the Whoa, Nelly! vinyl one day in a record shop and think it was cool or inspiring,” she added. “So I never could have guessed that there would be so many new ways to discover ‘old’ music in 2025!”
Furtado described the experience of seeing younger audiences rediscover her songs as “surreal and joyful.” She also extended words of encouragement to upcoming artists, saying, “I wish the new generation of artists many years of fruitful and passionate performance.”
In a September 2024 interview with PEOPLE, Furtado spoke about how deeply moved she felt performing for younger fans. “The Gen Z’s singing all the words blew my brain,” she said, recalling her experience at an Australian music festival. “I went, ‘Whoa, this is real. This is not just a fun app. This is my music reconnecting.’”
Furtado released her comeback album 7 in September 2024, her first project in seven years, which she recorded alongside her daughter Nevis Gahunia, 22. “It just felt like the greatest gift in the world,” she told PEOPLE. “What a blessing.”
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