Pabi Cooper Opens Up About Incorporating Her Love For Soccer In Her Music Career. Born Paballo Mothapo, Cooper started out as a dancer who performed at small scale concerts. Despite being noted as an entertaining dancer, the multi-talented musician believed there was more to her as a performer than just dancing.
In high school, Cooper was a part of the choir and although she had a great singing voice, she would ditch choir practice for soccer referee lessons, that’s how she knew her love for the sport wasn’t just a phase.“I come from a family of soccer fans, so that to me was more exciting than singing.”My grandmother supports Kaizer Chiefs and I support Orlando Pirates. We used to watch soccer on Saturdays and she would teach me what an offsite meant and the rules of the game. Soccer has been my outlet since I was young,” says the 21-year-old.
The pandemic hit at a time the star was ready to launch her soccer career, however, the hard knock left Cooper scratching the surface of some of her talents that have solidified her in becoming the star she is today. With that said, Cooper vows to still pursue both her music and soccer careers, as she merges the best of her both worlds. “Yes, my music career might be peaking to an upper level but one thing I will make sure of regarding my career is to be involved in African football as a match official – my passion for soccer won’t be clouded by my music career. But now that I am in the music industry, I am working on ways of how to incorporate me being a professional referee into my music. I mean, I sometimes dress like a referee when I perform and in my music videos,” she said.
Pabi recalled on when things started panning out for her, leading to the release of her first and biggest amapiano single ‘Isphithiphithi’. “Things started panning out for me last year when I first released my song Isphithiphithi… that’s when I became big. I performed on Idols SA and started touring the country. How I grew as an artist blew my mind… I couldn’t believe it. A lot of artists such as the late Mpura and Killa Kau were so excited to see my growth. They would validate my craft every time they saw me.”
