ESSENCE (March 1998) pg.60
“People” (profiles of six creative American African women)
It's been three years in the making, but at last R & B
singer Tamia, a Quincy Jones find, has a self-titled debut album
she can call her own, and it includes the tasty Jermaine Dupri-
produced first single "Imagination." The 21-year-old singer, who
was signed to Jones's Qwest Records label in 1995, reveals: "It
got to the point where I just stopped telling people when my
album was coming out. I'd record a lot of songs write a few, then
throw them all away and start again! Finally I had to let go and
let God in on the process."
The singing process, if not the selection one, has been a
little easier for Tamia. While still in a high chair in her
native Windsor, Ontario, Canada, she was first exposed to the
Motown sound. "My mother and her five sisters would sing like
they were the Supremes to entertain me."
Quincy Jones was moved by the passion in Tamia's voice when
he saw her perform in Las Vegas in 1994. Right after she sang in
front of 7,500 people, the music impresario invited Tamia to Los
Angeles to appear on his first album in six years, Q's Jook
Joint. She ended up a featured vocalist on the first single
release, "You Put a Move on My Heart."
Suffice it to say, Tamia carried on. The proof: In 1996 she
received a Grammy nomination for the song in the Best Female R&B
Vocal Performance category Looking back, the singer exclaims,
"Can you imagine being 18 years old in the vocal booth with
Quincy Jones waiting for you to sing his song? What an
experience!" and then her ballad dreams soared even higher. Hit
maker Babyface also chose her to share the spotlight with him on
Jook's second single, the romantic duet "Slow Jams," which
garnered them a Grammy nomination for Best R&B performance by a
duo.
But the effervescent vocalist doesn't just sing about
romance -- she lives it too. Last year in Detroit she met her
current beau, basketball star Grant Hill. But sometimes, says the
singer, she needs a dose of down-home reality. "Los Angeles is
like Disneyland," Tamia laughs. "When I go home to Windsor, my
mom is like, 'Clean your room, and don't forget to do the dirty
dishes!"
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