Siedah Garrett
Deborah Christine "Siedah" Garrett[2] (born June 24, 1960) is an American singer and songwriter who has written songs and performed backing vocals for many recording artists in the music industry, such as Michael Jackson, the Pointer Sisters, Brand New Heavies, Quincy Jones, Tevin Campbell, Donna Summer, Madonna, Jennifer Hudson among others. Garrett has been nominated for two Academy Awards for Best Original Song, and won the Grammy Award for Best Song Written for Visual Media at the 50th Annual Grammy Awards for co-writing "Love You I Do" (performed by Jennifer Hudson) for the 2006 musical film, Dreamgirls.
Siedah Garrett
Deborah Christine Garrett
June 24, 1960
Los Angeles, California, U.S.[1]
- Singer
- songwriter
- composer
- Vocals
- piano
- keyboards
1977–present
Biography[edit]
Garrett was born on June 24, 1960, in Los Angeles and raised in Compton, where she started singing as a child.[2] Born Deborah Christine Garrett, she opted to change her name at age 13, because of the disdain she had towards her birth name. Garrett said, "It's a pretty name but nobody called me Deborah. It was always abbreviated to Deb, Debbie, or DeeDee. I hated it".[2] She later changed it to Siedah, which meant "shining and star-like".[3] As a teenager, Garrett was part of a five piece band called Black Velvet & Satin Soul, which performed Top 40 hits around various clubs. Garrett's mother was an interior designer who had singer D.J. Rogers as one of her clients. Rogers heard Garrett's singing abilities and recruited her as a background vocalist on his 1977 album, Love, Music and Life.[3]
Career[edit]
1980s[edit]
Siedah Garrett appeared as a contestant on Password Plus in 1980. Later, she joined the soul/funk outfit Plush, who released their self-titled album in 1982 on RCA Records. She soon began stepping out on her own as a solo artist. Her hits include "Don't Look Any Further" with Dennis Edwards (No. 72 pop, No. 2 R&B in 1984); "Do You Want It Right Now?" in 1985 from the Fast Forward soundtrack[4] (No. 3 Hot Dance Music/Club Play and No. 63 R&B), which was covered by Taylor Dayne in 1988 and later covered by Armand Van Helden in 2007 under the title "I Want Your Soul"; "Everchanging Times" from the movie Baby Boom (No. 30 on the Adult Contemporary chart in 1987), and "K.I.S.S.I.N.G." (No. 97 in 1988). The latter song went to No. 1 on the Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. In the mid-1980s, she also toured and recorded with Sergio Mendes, appearing on three of his albums.
In 1987, Garrett was involved in Michael Jackson's Bad album, singing a duet with Jackson on the number one single "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" and co-writing and singing backing vocals on another number one, "Man in the Mirror". In a 2013 interview with Luka Neskovic, Garrett said: "All I wanted to do was give Michael something he would want to say to the world, and I knew it couldn't be another 'Oh baby, I love you' song. It had to be a little bit more than that. It needed to have some substance. He hadn't recorded anything like this to that point. I was just taking the risk that he might not get it, you know. First of all, I need to send it through Quincy because if Quincy didn't like it there is no way that Michael would've ever heard it. It was a huge privilege for me when Quincy decided that the song was good enough to play for Michael."[5]
Garrett and Jackson recorded a Spanish version of "I Just Can't Stop Loving You", titled "Todo Mi Amor Eres Tu" (translated to "All My Love Is You"),[6] as well as a French version titled "Je Ne Veux Pas La Fin De Nous", during the same recording sessions for the "Bad" album. A gifted musical sight reader with perfect vocal pitch (as most session vocalists are), the initial duet for "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" came as a total surprise to Garrett who simply answered the call expecting to only appear as a background vocalist. She initially felt intimidated with excitement when she entered the recording booth and noticed two music stands with sheet music that had lyric parts labeled "Michael" and "Siedah".
Garrett's association with Jackson enabled her to sing on several Quincy Jones albums of the 1980s and 1990s. Affectionately dubbed "Sid" by Quincy Jones, she co-wrote the hit songs "Tomorrow (A Better You, Better Me)" (originally an instrumental tune by The Brothers Johnson to which she added lyrics), "Back On The Block", and "The Secret Garden (Sweet Seduction Suite)", in addition to performing lead vocals for "I Don't Go for That", "One Man Woman" and "The Places You Find Love", all on Jones' Grammy Award-winning 1989 Back on the Block album.
In addition, Garrett's 1988 solo album Kiss Of Life includes "Baby's Got It Bad", a version of Jackson's "Got The Hots" with rewritten lyrics. "Got The Hots" was an unreleased track from the Thriller sessions at the time, but has since been released.
In 1989, she forayed into the acting world, starring in a TV sitcom pilot for NBC called "Wally and the Valentines" opposite William Ragsdale, Audrey Meadows, Tatyana Ali, Tevin Campbell and Cindy Herron.
1990s[edit]
In 1990, she became host of the show America's Top 10. In 1995 Garrett was also involved with Maysa Leak's (of the group Incognito) solo debut album as co-writer of the track "Sexy" in which she also sang backing vocals.
Garrett also toured with Michael Jackson from 1992 to 1993 on his Dangerous World Tour, singing backing vocals and duetting with him for "I Just Can't Stop Loving You". In the Dangerous album, Garrett also wrote a song "Keep the Faith" with Michael Jackson and Glen Ballard, the co-songwriter of "Man in the Mirror". She appears in the concert film "Michael Jackson Live in Bucharest: The Dangerous Tour".
In 1996, she joined the Brand New Heavies, collaborating on just one album, 1997's Shelter. As part of the band, she co-wrote their top 5 hit "Sometimes" and enjoyed a minor hit with a cover of Carole King's "You've Got A Friend". Garrett left the group in early 1998 to concentrate on her own songwriting. In 1997, she wrote "Be Good or Be Gone" for Edyta Górniak.
Personal life[edit]
She announced that she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS) when performing at the "Race to Erase MS" event in 2017.[13]