A Paris night of promise
On Saturday 7 March 2026, at exactly 6:30 p.m., the Nouveau Casino in Paris will swap its usual indie guitars for the hypnotic loops of DJ Rox Ikartashi, the Pointe-Noire beat-maker whose rise has electrified dance floors from Ouesso to Accra.
The 380-seat room, hidden behind a discreet glass façade in the 11th arrondissement, has already hosted Papa Wemba and Angélique Kidjo; the invitation signals that the Congolese newcomer now plays in the continental big league, say promoters at Alex Soon Production.
For many young fans back home, the booking also refutes the gloomy saying that Europe has become a graveyard for Central-African artists, a narrative frequently repeated on social networks after the pandemic.
Local radio station Radio Pointe-Noire confirmed the date after cross-checking with the venue’s online schedule and the French ticketing platform Digitick, which opened reservations last Friday.
From street battles to beat maker
Born Austhy Nguetali in the vibrant Mbota district, the future DJ first earned pocket money as a street dancer during the early 2000s boom of hip-hop battles that lit up Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire boulevards every weekend.
Passy from Bisso Na Bisso, MC Solaar and Junior Vall were his unofficial masters; their bilingual flows taught him that rhythmic agility and linguistic versatility can open unexpected doors.
When night clubs along the Boulevard Charles-de-Gaulle started hiring him as a selector, he added Ikartashi – a slang term meaning strength – to his stage name, sensing that turntables would take him further than pure rap ever could.
The signature sound gaining ground
His first do-it-yourself single, Danse à la Papa, mixed coupé-décalé kicks with an afro-beat bass line recorded in a friend’s bedroom; the track unexpectedly topped the urban playlist of Radio Mucodec for eight straight weeks in 2021.
Fans nicknamed his falsetto ‘the digital voice’ because a slight Auto-Tune shimmer makes every chorus glide like a ringtone, yet the lyrics stay grounded in kituba, lingala, lari and French street slang, creating an inclusive party code.
That formula travelled well; between 2022 and 2024 he toured Morocco, Senegal, Benin, Togo, Ghana and Angola, often as a support act for heavyweights such as Wizkid or Sidiki Diabaté, according to regional music site Music inafrica.
The recognition peaked in 2023 when a jury of critics and bloggers meeting in Abidjan named him Best Congolese Diaspora Artist, an award he dedicated ‘to the neighborhoods that taught me to dream’ during a livestream on his Facebook page.
Stakes, strategies and digital buzz
Landing a headline slot at Nouveau Casino therefore feels like both a reward and a test; ‘Paris can crown you or drown you,’ he joked during a Voice of Congo interview last month, adding that rehearsals now start at dawn.
Friend and producer Cedro-La-Loi is polishing a surprise collaborative single that should drop days before the Paris date, a strategy meant to spike online searches and drive late ticket sales, according to their shared manager.
Alex Soon Production confirms that visual content will follow mobile-first codes: vertical rehearsal snippets on TikTok, a 60-second backstage reel on Instagram and real-time set-list updates via Twitter Spaces.
Community support and practical details
Congolese diaspora groups in Île-de-France plan a warm welcome, arranging shared rides from Gare du Nord and printing mini-flags in green, yellow and red; organisers recommend arriving early because the hall’s pit area fills in minutes once doors open at 17:45.
Standard tickets cost 25 euros, with a limited 40-euro VIP package offering a post-show meet-and-greet; sales data accessed Tuesday morning show the event already 60 percent full.
Whether you stream from Brazzaville or dance in the front row, the 7 March set could mark a watershed moment for a generation dreaming of exporting Congolese pop without losing its street-corner soul – a challenge DJ Rox Ikartashi seems eager to embrace.
Ripple effects for Congo’s creative scene
Economic analysts in Brazzaville note that each successful overseas booking boosts local creative jobs, from videographers to tailors crafting stage outfits; the Ministry of Culture estimates that music exports generated 1.2 billion CFA francs in 2024, a 15 percent rise year-on-year.
Producer Landry Mavoungou, who runs a modest home studio in Makélékélé, hopes the Paris spotlight will attract micro-investors; ‘When one of us breaks through, equipment prices fall for everybody,’ he argues, citing the drop in condenser-mic costs after Gaz Fabilouss’s Belgian tour.
What the show may sound and look like
Though the final set list remains under wraps, insiders whisper that evergreen hit Madoda will open the show, followed by a new Afropiano experiment sampling Congolese rumba guitars, before closing with Deuxième Leçon in a fast, club-ready remix clocking in under four minutes.
Lighting designer Maëva Koumba promises an immersive palette mixing Pointe-Noire sunsets and Atlantic blues; lasers are banned in the venue, so she relies on LED panels and fog bursts to sketch what she calls ‘a moving postcard for homesick hearts’.
