MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — Grammy-nominated R&B singer Angie Stone, a member of the all-female hip hop trio The Sequence and known for the hit song “Wish I Didn’t Miss You,” was killed early Saturday in a car crash. She was 63.
“Unfortunately, at around 4 a.m. while heading back to Atlanta from Alabama, the Sprinter flipped over and was subsequently hit by a big rig,” music producer Walter Millsap III told The Associated Press in an email. “Thankfully, all survived except for Angie.”
The singer-songwriter created hits like “No More Rain (In This Cloud)” which reached No. 1 for 10 weeks on Billboard’s Adult R&B airplay chart, “Baby” with legendary soul singer Betty Wright, another No. 1 hit, and “Wish I Didn’t Miss You” and “Brotha.”
She found a sweet spot in the early 2000s as neo-soul begin to dominate the R&B landscape with the emergence of singers like Erykah Badu, Jill Scott, Maxwell and D’Angelo.
Her 2001 album “Mahagony Soul” reached No. 22 on the Billboard 200, while 2007’s “The Art Of Love & War” peaked at No. 11.
The church-grown singer was born in Columbia, South Carolina. She helped form The Sequence, the first all-female group on the hip-hop trailblazing imprint Sugar Hill Records, becoming one of the first female groups to record a rap song.
After finding success in the early 1980s, Stone later joined the trio Vertical Hold before launching her solo career.
A Soul Train Lady of Soul winner, Stone went on to showcase her acting chops with film roles in “The Hot Chick” starring Rob Schneider, “The Fighting Temptations” which starred Cuba Gooding Jr. and Beyoncé, and “Ride Along” led by Ice Cube and Kevin Hart.
She also hit the Broadway stage as Big Mama Morton in “Chicago,” and she showcased her vulnerability on the reality TV shows “Celebrity Fit Club” and “R&B Divas: Atlanta.”
——
Associated Press reporter Gary Gerard Hamilton contributed to this report from New York.
