Evans, Faith

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FAITH EVANS

Born: Lakeland, Florida, 10 June 1973

Genre: R&B

Best-selling album since 1990: Keep the Faith (1998)

Hit songs since 1990: "You Used to Love Me," "Love Like This," "I Love You"

With a popularity ranking second only to that of Mary J. Blige, Faith Evans rose in the 1990s to become one of the most successful female performers in hip-hop. Possessing a strong, supple voice—hushed and intimate in its lower register and powerful on high notes—Evans brings to her performances a personal intensity rare among contemporary R&B artists. Much of her work is tinged with a perceptible sense of loss, a quality likely informed by her turbulent personal history: She is the widow of famed rapper the Notorious B.I.G., who was murdered in 1997. While Evans's career has often threatened to become overshadowed by this tragedy, by the early 2000s she had effectively freed herself from the controversy, releasing acclaimed albums and finding happiness with her new husband, record producer Todd Russaw.

Evans's early life gave little indication of the hardships that would follow in later years. Growing up in Newark, New Jersey, Evans sang gospel music in church and was a high school honor student, singing frequently in her school's plays and concerts. After graduation she earned a full scholarship to study marketing at Fordham University but left college after one year to pursue her dream of becoming a professional musician. By the early 1990s, Evans had found steady work as a backup singer and songwriter, contributing to Mary J. Blige's noted album, My Life (1994). Evans's work on the album brought her to the attention of producer Sean "Puff Daddy" Combs, who made her the first female artist signed to his Bad Boy label in 1995. Evans's debut album, Faith, appeared the same year and featured hits such as "You Used to Love Me" and "Soon as I Get Home." The album provides the first evidence of Evans's unique style; alternating soft, breathy phrasing with rough-hewn testifying that recalls her gospel upbringing, she infuses hip-hop with a soaring air of spirituality.

In 1995 Evans met the Notorious B.I.G., also known as Biggie Smalls, and married him after a courtship of nine days. Although the couple gave birth to a son, Christopher Wallace Jr., their relations had become tense by mid-1996: Smalls became publicly involved with rapper Lil' Kim, while Evans was rumored to have shared a liaison with Smalls's rival, rapper Tupac Shakur. In September 1996, Shakur was shot to death in a drive-by shooting, and, in an example of the increasingly public nature of violence in the rap world, Smalls met a similar fate just six months later. Although an aggrieved Evans was featured on Combs's hit tribute to Smalls, "I'll Be Missing You" (1997), she otherwise retreated from the spotlight for the next year. In 1998 she returned with her second album, Keep the Faith, which includes the infectious dance hits "Love Like This" and "All Night Long." On ballads such as "Never Gonna Let You Go" and "Lately I," Evans displays an impressive ability to build emotion throughout a performance, shaping her songs with honesty and passion. The tender ballad, "My First Love," can be interpreted as a requiem for Smalls: "We never had the chance to make it get better / We never said goodbye."

Evans released a third solo album, Faithfully, in 2001, receiving her strongest reviews to date. Like Mary J. Blige's acclaimed No More Drama of the same year, Faithfully sports a hard, lean sound that emphasizes the tough side of hip-hop. On dance hits such as "Alone in This World," "You Gets No Love," and "Burnin' Up," Evans twists and improvises vocally around sinuous, groove-laden rhythms. Although the album's lyrics often fail to match the inspiration of its sound, Faithfully returns Evans to the forefront of contemporary R&B and showcases her new sense of self-respect and peace. On the blues-tinged "Brand New Man," she attests, "I don't have to be alone / Got somebody who understands." As with her finest work in the past, Evans presents an emotional arc within the song, using her flexible, expansive voice to convey liberation and release. By 2001 she had settled into a quiet home life in Georgia with husband and manager Russaw. In addition, she formed her own production company, Pedigree MGI, and earned respect for her active involvement in charity work with inner-city children.

Among the wave of hip-hop stars to emerge in the mid-1990s, Faith Evans was unique; her full-powered voice and moody, introspective sound brought a new emotional clarity to modern R&B. Displaying personal resilience and a tough spirit, Evans overcame the loss of famous husband Notorious B.I.G. to become an acclaimed artist in her own right.