Mary J. Blige - A Profile

Mary J. Blige was born in The Bronx, NYC, on 11 Jan 1971 and is therefore 52 today. She spent her early childhood in Georgia where she sang in church before moving back to New York. She had a troubled childhood with her Vietnam veteran father suffering from PTSD and alcoholism who left the family. At the age of 5 she was molested and endured sexual harassment as a teenager and turned to drugs, alcohol and promiscuous sex and dropped out of high school.

Her  break in music came from a cover of Anita Baker's "Caught Up In The Rapture" which she recorded in a recording booth that her mother's boyfriend played for the A&R man at Uptown Records which resulted in her being signed to the label as a backing singer in 1989. By 1992 she had completed her debut album "What's The 411?" produced by Sean 'Puff Daddy' Coombes. It topped the R&B chart and reached #6 on the pop album chart and is now a triple platinum selling album (i.e. selling over 3m copies) and won her two Soul Train Music Awards in 1993 for Best New R&B Artist and Best R&B Album.

Since then she has released fourteen studio albums all of which have reached the top 10 in the Billboard 200 Chart except her last "Good Morning Gorgeous" which peaked at #14. Four reached #1 and her first nine were all #1 R&B with her twelfth also hitting #1, of the remaining four, three reached #2 and her last got to #9.

From 2001 she has also featured in several movies being nominated for an Oscar and Golden Globe for her role as Florence Jackson in Mudbound in 2017. She most recently featured as Dinah Washington in the Aretha Franklin biopic ' Respect' in 2021.

Her most acclaimed album is probably "The Breakthrough" which received eight Grammy nominations winning three for "Best Female R&B Vocal Performance", "Best R&B Song" (both for "Be Without You"), and "Best R&B Album". The single "Be Without You" was also nominated for  "Record of the Year" and "Song of the Year". 

Blige has won 9 Grammys:

2009 - Best Contemporary R&B Album - Growing Pains

2008 - Best R&B Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocals - Disrespectful

2008 - Best Gospel Performance - Never Gonna Break My Faith

2005 - Best Female R&B Vocal Performance - Be Without You

2005 - Best R&B Song - Be Without You

2005 - Best R&B Album - The Breakthrough

2004 - Best Pop Collaboration With Vocals - Whenever I Say Your Name

2003 - Best Female R&B Vocal Performance - He Think I Don't Know

1996 - Best Rap Performance By A Duo Or Group - I'll Be There For You/You're All I Need To Get By

and has four nominations for 2023

Best R&B Performance - "Here With Me" – Mary J. Blige featuring Anderson .Paak

Best Traditional R&B Performance - "Good Morning Gorgeous"

Best R&B Song - "Good Morning Gorgeous"

Best R&B Album - Good Morning Gorgeous (Deluxe) – Mary J. Blige

Album Discography

1992 - What's the 411?

1994 - My Life

1997 - Share My World

1999 - Mary

2001 - No More Drama

2003 - Love & Life

2005 - The Breakthrough

2007 - Growing Pains

2009 - Stronger with Each Tear

2011 - My Life II... The Journey Continues (Act 1)

2013 - A Mary Christmas

2014 - The London Sessions

2017 - Strength of a Woman

2022 - Good Morning Gorgeous

With an artist as high profile as Mary J. Blige her material is pretty well know, so by way of a change here's a playlist of 32 collaborations, covers or samples. Many of which haven't appeared on her solo albums but rather on soundtracks or compilations or on other artists albums so some may not be that well known other than to die hard fans of her music. 

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