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8:00 PM FRIDAY, JULY 20, 2018
PAVILION
MARY J. BLIGE
†
†
Ravinia debut
MARY J. BLIGE
Growing up in Georgia in New York, Mary J.
Blige changed her life with an impromptu re-
cording of Anita Baker’s “Caught Up in the Rap-
ture” made at a mall in 1988. The tape found its
way to MCA affiliate Uptown Records, which
signed her initially as a backing singer—the la-
bel’s youngest and first female artist. In the early
1990s, Blige began working with Sean “Diddy”
Combs, who would become the executive pro-
ducer of her first album,
What’s the 411?
, which
revealed a gritty, urban-rooted style that fused
hip-hop and soul, interpolating such early in-
fluences as Aretha Franklin, Chaka Khan, and
Gladys Knight with her own experience. The
disc quickly became a top-10, multiplatinum hit
off the popularity of her first two singles, “You
Remind Me” and “Real Love,” both gold-selling
R&B number ones, and it earned Blige a Soul
Train Award as Best New R&B Artist. She fol-
lowed up in 1994 with the deeply personal
My
Life
, which has since been included in “best of
all time” lists by both
Rolling Stone
and
Time
Magazine and earned Blige her first Grammy
nomination. Blige transitioned to a more tradi-
tional soul sound on 1997’s
Share My World
, her
first number-one disc, which featured her plat-
inum-selling contribution to the
Waiting to Ex-
hale
soundtrack, “Not Gon’ Cry.” Her 2001 disc,
No More Drama
, featured her first number-one
hit, “Family Affair,” which has remained one of
her best-loved songs, along with the title track.
Blige then released three straight number-one
albums,
Love and Life
(2003),
The Breakthrough
(2005), and
Growing Pains
(2007), adding the
multiplatinum single “Be Without You,” which
was nominated for both Record and Song of
the Year at the 2007 Grammys, to her catalogue
of hits. Her most recent album is
Strength of a
Woman
(2017), her 14th top-10 disc. Blige began
acting in 2009 in Tyler Perry’s comedy
I Can Do
Bad All By Myself
before taking a dramatic turn
in
Betty & Coretta
(2013) and starring as Evil-
lene in NBC’s 2015 live broadcast of
The Wiz
.
She earned Oscar nominations earlier this year
for both her starring role in
Mudbound
and her
original song, “Mighty River,” for its soundtrack.
Mary J. Blige is making her Ravinia debut.