” By the time Blige was a teenager, she had solo spots in the choir and she made the rounds of local talent shows. She expanded on the experience for Essence ’s Gregory, remembering that she “felt so much better going to church every Sunday, just being there, testifying and just being kids. Everybody would be real good to us, ” Blige told Emil Wilbekin in a Vibe interview. Released albums, What ’s the 4111 1992 What ’s the 41U-The Remix, 1993 My Ufe, 1994 Share My World, 1996 The Tour, 1998 Mary, 1999 No More Drama, 2001 appeared on The Jamie Foxx Show, 1998 film, Prison Song, 2000 performed in VM ’s Divas Live concerts, 1999, 2001, 2002.Īwards: Soul Train Music Award, 1993 New York Music Award NAACP Image Award double-platinum album award for Whatfs the 411 Ì Grammy nomination for Best R&B Album, 1995, 1999, 2002 Grammy award, Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group, with Method Man, 1996 American Music Award, 1998 Soul Train Lady of Soul awards, 1997, 1998 celebrity spokesperson, MAC AIDS Fund, 2001, 2002.Īddresses: Record company - MCA Records, c/o Maria Kleinman, National Director of Publicity, 70 universal City Plaza, Universal City, CA, 91608 Web-she - costal Church, honing vocal skills and imbibing gospel. Blige sang regularly with her mother and sister in the choir at the House of Prayer Pente At a Glance …īorn Mary Jane Blige, January 11, 1971, in Yon-kers, NY daughter of Cora (a nurse) and a jazz musician.Ĭareer: Worked various part-time jobs in late teens. At home, her mother played a steady stream of R&B, soul, and funk, including Sam Cooke, Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, Chaka Khan, and Gladys Knight. Block parties in the Bronx taught her the rhythms and sampling styles created by the early hip-hop deejays. A professional jazz musician, her father left his mark on Blige ’s ability to harmonize during the brief time he was present. “Watching my mother struggle to raise us and feed us made me want to be a stronger woman, ” she continued.īlige ’s environment also provided the sound and encouragement that first shaped her musical identity. “My mother made me strong, ” Blige told the Source. ” The family, including Blige ’s older sister and two younger brothers, subsisted on her mother Cora ’s earnings as a nurse after her father left the family in the mid-1970s. If you try to get out, one of the other crabs tries to pull you down. Growing up in the projects is like living in a barrel of crabs. You always had to prove yourself to keep from getting robbed or jumped. Every day I would be getting into fights over whatever. Blige described the setting for Essence ’s Deborah Gregory, recalling that there “was always some shit going on. Blige ’s coming of age on the mean streets of the Bronx provided her with the “credentials ” demanded by audiences who also grew up on city streets. ” She was born on Januin Yonkers, and grew up in the Schlobohm Housing Projects -or “Slow Bomb ” projects as its residents called it. Part of the fuel for Blige ’s rocket to hip-hop stardom was her “street cred. ” But more than anything else, the music media has crowned her the Queen of Hip Hop Soul. ” In his Washington Post review of Blige ’s second album, Geoffrey Himes called her “the premier soul diva of the hip-hop generation. In an interview for the Source, Adario Strange described his subject as a “delicate ghetto-princess songstress, ” “the flower of the ghetto, ” and “the real momma of hip-hop R&B. When the vocalist came to the public ’s attention the previous year, she became a magnet for the kind of superlatives music critics love to create. Blige has been called the inventor of New Jill Swing, ” Ron Givens wrote in Stereo Review in 1993.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |