In her youth, she had decided to change the spelling of her first name from Erica to Erykah, as she believed her original name was a " slave name". Badu had her first taste of show business at the age of four, singing and dancing at the Dallas Theater Center and The Black Academy of Arts and Letters (TBAAL) under the guidance of her godmother, Gwen Hargrove, and uncle TBAAL founder Curtis King.īy the age of 14, Badu was freestyling for a local radio station alongside such talent as Roy Hargrove. The children's maternal and paternal grandmothers often helped look after them. Her mother raised her, her brother Eevin, and her sister alone after separating from their father, William Wright Jr.
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Her first live album, Live, was released in November 1997 and was certified double Platinum by the RIAA. The album was certified triple Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). It spawned four singles: " On & On", " Appletree", " Next Lifetime" and " Otherside of the Game". Her first album, Baduizm, was released in February 1997. Badu's career began after she opened a show for D'Angelo in 1994 in Fort Worth record label executive Kedar Massenburg was highly impressed with her performance and signed her to Kedar Entertainment. She has been called the “Queen of Neo Soul”. Influenced by R&B, 1970s soul, and 1980s hip hop, Badu became associated with the neo soul subgenre in the 1990s and 2000s along with artists such as D'Angelo and Maxwell. Erica Abi Wright (born February 26, 1971), known professionally as Erykah Badu ( / ˈ ɛr ɪ k ə b ɑː ˈ d uː/), is an American singer-songwriter, record producer and actress.