Brother Ali Finds Himself One “Minute” at a Time in Istanbul, Turkey

Madison, Wisconsin-born rapper Brother Ali lives in Istanbul, Turkey. When asked, the acclaimed musician and lyricist said there are a number of reasons for his transition from where he and his wife were living in the Twin Cities region of Minnesota to the historic city in the Mediterranean, from religious to financial to personal.

Both Ali and his wife are Muslim converts and she had visited the region in 2014 to study. Upon her return, she predicted that they’d one day find themselves there but they thought it would be around retirement age. Yet, the shift happened more recently due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the restrictions it put on Ali’s career as a touring musician. They began to rethink what life could be. So, they moved. The new surroundings have given Ali the first occasion in his life to think about who he was and what he wanted from a longer-term perspective, which has both contributed to new music he released recently—like his new Brother Minutester record—and to the way he thinks about his place in the world.