Gustavo Dudamel and New York Philharmonic

Lizzo — real name Melissa Viviane Jefferson—was born in Detroit, Michigan. She relocated to Houston, Texas, at age 10, and graduated high school with eight years of classical flute training and nearly as many years of rapping under her belt. Her talent for the flute took her to the University of Houston to study classical music. At age 21, her father died, and she began earnest attempts to break into the music industry, dropping out of college and living out of her car for a year.

In 2011, Lizzo moved to the Twin Cities and formed several groups including the electro-soul band Lizzo & the Larva Ink, which became popular in the Minneapolis area. However, it was her debut hip-hop album that showcased her unique style. Called Lizzobangers, this album received immediate critical acclaim and was heralded for its “joyfully nonsensical” “stream-of-consciousness rhymes.”

In 2013, just two years after moving to Minneapolis, Lizzo toured the UK and the US opening for Har Mar Superstar and was selected for the “Picked to Click” award for Best New Artist in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis-St. Paul). Her debut album was re-released by Virgin Records, and Lizzo rounded the year off by performing with St. Paul and the Broken Bones.

Lizzo made quick work in taking over Minneapolis, but a more global audience was awaiting her. She took part in StyleLikeU’s “What’s Underneath” project in 2014, taking off articles of clothing and discussing body image. That experience partly inspired her forthcoming second album Big Grrrl Small World, and was the subject of her song “My Skin.”

Big Grrrl Small World came out December 11, 2015, and was named one of the 50 best hip-hop albums of the year by Spin magazine. Coconut Oil, Lizzo’s first major-label EP, came out October 2016. Led by the chart-topping single “Good as Hell,” this EP focused on self-love and body positivity how-to’s. It was a huge critical success, called “essential for healthy living” by Nylon. It even made Rolling Stone’s “20 Best Pop Albums of 2016” list and was her first release to reach the charts.

Lizzo rode the wave into 2017 with the Good as Hell tour, and in early 2018, she toured with Florence and the Machine and Haim. Though she was quickly becoming the face of body positivity in music, she made a point of promoting diverse body types, races, sexuality, and more. The Big Grrrls backup dancers were all plus-size.

Lizzo’s third studio album, Cuz I Love You, was preceded by the release of her single “Juice.” The album dropped on April 19, 2019, and marked a breakthrough moment in her career. She performed at Coachella and reached number four on the Billboard 200 chart. Her single “Truth Hurts” was a sleeper hit, slowly rising to #1 spot on the Billboard Hot 100. This made her the first Black solo female R&B singer to hit the number-one spot since 2012.

In the time since, Lizzo has live-performed flute at the BET Awards, at pride festivals in Sacramento and Indianapolis, at the Glastonbury Festival, in Somerset, UK, on Saturday Night Live, at the Australian FOMO Festival, and in other big spots around the world. She’s won three Grammys and has been nominated numerous times at the BET Awards, Billboard Music Awards, and more.

2021 saw the release of the song “Rumors,” followed by the 2022 release of “About Damn Time.” Lizzo said her fourth album, Special, was going to be “one of the most musically badass, daring, and sophisticated bodies of work I’ve done to date.” It came out on July 15, 2022, and was everything she promised it to be: diverse, genre-bending, and inspirational, just like her.

She kept busy musically playing jazz in her high school’s band and also developed business sensibilities pertinent to the industry by acting as the touring manager for her aunt and uncle’s jazz duo Tuck & Patti. She was just a teenager when she acquired this position! Before participating as a touring musician for indie mainstays like Sufjan Stevens and the Polyphonic Spree she attended the prestigious Berklee College of Music. Though it was not seen as an official St. Vincent release, Annie Clark made her first EP Ratsliveonnoevilstar in 2003 while attending Berklee. On this EP she recruited the help of fellow Berklee students Mark Kelley and Walker Adams.

It wasn’t until 2006 when her moniker St. Vincent was fully realized, a name that she lifted from a Nick Cave lyric. Her first recorded work under this name “Paris is Burning” was released that year. She put out her follow up debut album “Marry Me” a year later. Like many endearing idiosyncratic artists, her music is difficult to pinpoint or ascribe a genre to. Her career spans across an eclectic range of influences and makes no attempt in segmenting these various styles. Rather they are mixed together in interesting ways and given stylistic revamping in regards to Clark’s own signature touch.

Her first album saw her honing in on her skill as a jazz musician. “Marry Me” features many songs drawing from cabaret jazz and builds off lush orchestrated sounds encompassing melodic percussive instruments like the dulcimer, xylophone, and vibraphone, brass instruments such as the trumpet and French horn, a variety of string instruments and even a choir for good measure. With each subsequent release her style seemed to diverge. Her 2009 album “Actor” saw a shift to a baroque pop type of sound. She wrote this album with the idea that it would back a Disney or Woody Allen movie. Naturally this album had a cinematic type quality featuring string swells, angelically plucked guitar, and dramatically juxtaposing lead riffs.

Her following two albums “Strange Mercy” and her self-titled release delved into mutated electronic sounds and lyrics steeped in introspection and literary abstraction. These albums consisted of subtle sonic palates disrupted by angular guitars, detuned moogs and haunting prose. Her latest release incorporated the space-like funk sounds exhibited by artists like Sun Ra and George Clinton and added a certain playful absurdity lacking on her previous albums. Despite the unconventional chord progressions and surrealist lyrics heard through out her later albums they remained highly accessible and eventually became recognized as landmark albums not only in her catalogue but in the framework of indie and pop music.

St. Vincent has wowed audiences across the globe and has managed to make converts out of many well respected and established artists, David Byrne being one of them. In 2012 she collaborated with Byrne to make the album “Love This Giant” and followed it up with a worldwide tour. She has continually redefined herself as an artist and has surprised audiences by performing an assortment of daring cover songs. She has performed works by the political post-punk band the Pop Group, the wild but nonetheless brilliant Tom Waits, and even an overtly abrasive track by Big Black. Perhaps her most famous live cover was her rendition of “Lithium” with Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic at the 29th induction of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Though St. Vincent has been an act for less than eight years she has established herself as one of the most important pop musicians of her time.