For the better part of her life, music has served as a salvation of sorts for Kelly Price. It’s no secret the Grammy-nominated singer was forced to grow up before she was old enough to order a cocktail, let alone declare herself an adult. When she was 17 years old, Price moved to Atlanta and made a pact with herself that she would not go back to her old stomping grounds in Far Rockaway neighborhood of Queens, New York, because she “had nothing to go back to.”
She was homeless with no place to live, and the South simply offered a better outlook on what she hoped was a budding future as a songstress. As fate would have it, the plan to get a job and continue to pursue her career only lasted about a year before she moved back home. Reluctant as she may have been to go back, there clearly was some otherworldly force working in her favor.
“Literally 30 days after I moved back, I got called to do [a] job with George Michael,” she remembers. “A month after that, I got called to do a job with Mariah Carey. … The rest is history. I am a living breathing testimony of God’s timing.”
As a result of God’s timing and favor, Price has enjoyed the fruits of her labor, earning countless nominations, a Soul Train Music Award and two certified platinum albums (Soul of a Woman and Mirror Mirror). Most recently, she delivered her second full-length gospel album, Grace, which was released on April 2, 2021, through her Sang Girl! record label in conjunction with Motown/Capitol Records.
A true testament to her resilience and determined spirit, the album, led by the upbeat single, “Dance Party,” represents a sense of liberation unearthed by one of the darkest times in her life.
“All in all, I lost about 15 people last year. I attended all of those services virtually, with the exception of my mother’s funeral,” she explains. “I attended my mother’s funeral in person. It was a really challenging year, and I had to try and be intentional to, like everybody else, stay sane through the crazy.
“I literally sat at home for a year and all my needs were met. That was a blessing, and I just changed the way I was writing. And I knew that this project was necessary for right now before I even put out an R&B album. The R&B album is pretty much ready to go, but I pumped the brakes on it because I felt like, after the way the year happened, it was necessary to kind of put some hope and some joy and some peace and some dancing back into the feet of people. So what is different about this project? People are very used to Kelly Price power ballads, [and] I did not disappoint on this one. But there’s more dance music on this project than normal, and that was intentional as well because I told myself, ‘I’m tired of crying.’ So I can imagine everybody else is, too. Let’s dance.”
In addition to music, the multitalented Price has put her thespian skills to the test as a regular on BET’s singing competition “Sunday Best” and TV One’s breakout hit series “American Soul.”
Interestingly enough, her addition to the show provided nostalgic vibes that literally took Price back to the infancy of her career. Dating back to the early 1990s, Price’s immense talent brought on a variety of opportunities, including vocal coaching and background singing, that allowed her to work freely and collect checks from practically every major label in the industry. The public, however, had no idea who she was. Then one day, Hiriam Hicks, the then-president of Island Black Music, took a meeting with Don Cornelius during which he told the “Soul Train” architect about Price.
“He played ‘Friend of Mine’ for Don, and he was like, ‘I need to meet this girl. She needs to be on the show,’ ” Price says. “And so he showed him my photos and everything because people hadn’t seen me yet. And he was like, ‘Yeah, we need to do this.’ So the truth is my very first national appearance on television was on a ‘Soul Train’ stage. My very first award was a New Artist of the Year at the ‘Soul Train Awards.’
“So, fast-forward so many years. To audition for that show and to get the role and be a part of telling the story of his life, it was really surreal. I went from screaming to crying the day I got a call from casting, but it was tears of joy.”
Three decades and counting, Kelly Price continues to deliver timeless material and performances worthy of our praise as she has from the very beginning.
Written by N. Ali Early
Images by Derek Blanks
To watch the interview in its entirety, click here.
