Diana Ross

Singer

• Born: March 26, 1944
• Birthplace: Detroit, Michigan

Singer and actor

Ross became one of the most successful performers in American history. As a member of the Supremes and later as a solo artist, she helped shape pop music. Ross, also an award-winning actor, sold more than 100 million records throughout her long and illustrious career.

Areas of achievement: Fashion; Film: acting; Music: pop

Early Life

Diana Ernestine Earle Ross was born March 26, 1944, in Detroit, Michigan, to Ernestine Earle Ross and Fred Ross. She was the second of six children. The family lived in the Brewster-Douglass Housing Projects. Interested in music from an early age, Ross participated in the choir at Olivet Baptist Church. She aspired to a future in fashion design and was voted Best Dressed Girl her senior year at Cass Technical High School in downtown Detroit.

In 1959, with the encouragement of neighbor and classmate Mary Wilson, Ross became a member of the female vocal group the Primettes, which also included Florence Ballard and Betty McGlown. Ross sang with the Primettes throughout her high school years. At the same time, Motown Records, founded in Detroit by Berry Gordy, Jr., in 1960, was becoming a major player in the music industry. Smokey Robinson, lead singer of the Miracles and Motown’s vice president, introduced the Primettes to Gordy. Upon graduating from high school, Ross, Ballard, and Wilson signed a contract with Motown. No longer a quartet, the group took on a new name, the Supremes.

Life’s Work

The Supremes quickly became one of the most successful American vocal groups of the 1960s. In 1964 and 1965, the group recorded six number-one hits: “Where Did Our Love Go?,” “Baby Love,” “Come See About Me,” “Stop! In the Name of Love,” “Back in My Arms Again,” and “I Hear a Symphony.” Ballard was replaced by Cindy Birdsong in 1967, and Supremes ultimately recorded a total of twelve number-one singles. Ross gradually became the group’s lead singer, and by 1969 they were being billed as Diana Ross and the Supremes. Soon after, Ross left to become a solo performer. Her final appearance with the Supremes was at the Frontier Hotel in Las Vegas on January 14, 1970.

Ross’s first solo album, Diana Ross, was released in 1970 by Motown. The album included her first number-one pop single as a solo artist, “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough.” The same year, Motown released Ross’s second album, Everything Is Everything, and she hosted her first solo television special, Diana! Motown Records, which had relocated to Hollywood, turned its focus to making Ross its first film star with Lady Sings the Blues (1972), which was based on the life of famed jazz singer Billie Holiday. The film was a critical and commercial success and Ross was nominated for an Academy Award for best actress. In 1972, shortly after filming Lady Sings the Blues, Ross recorded an all-jazz album titled Blue, which Motown Records did not release. The label urged Ross to capitalize on her success with pop music instead.

In 1975, Ross starred in the Motown film Mahogany, the story of an aspiring fashion designer. She fulfilled her childhood ambition by designing many of her costumes for the film. While a box office success, the film was not well received by the critics. Ross released several number-one singles in 1975–1976, including “Theme from Mahogany (Do You Know Where You’re Going To)” and the disco single “Love Hangover.” In 1977, Ross received a Tony Award for her one-woman show, An Evening with Diana Ross. That same year, Motown acquired the film rights to the popular Broadway play The Wiz. At the time, Motown’s The Wiz (1978) was the most expensive film musical ever made. It also was Ross’s final film for Motown. Although the film received mixed reviews, the sound track album sold more than 850,000 copies in its initial release. In 1979, Ross recorded her first gold album, The Boss, followed by her first platinum album, Diana, in 1980. The following year, “Endless Love,” Ross’s duet with Lionel Richie from the sound track to the film Endless Love (1981), reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and was nominated for an Academy Award. The song sold in excess of two million copies and was Ross’s first platinum single.

Ross left Motown and signed on with RCA Records in 1981. Her RCA Records debut, platinum seller Why Do Fools Fall in Love, was issued in October of that year. On July 21, 1983, Ross held a benefit concert in Central Park to fund the Diana Ross Playground, which was built three years later. She recorded several hit singles and gold albums during the mid-1980s, but her record sales began to wane in the United States by the close of the decade. Her popularity in Europe remained strong, however, and in 1999 Ross was named the most successful female singer in the history of the United Kingdom charts. From 1989 to 2002, Ross returned to Motown as a part-owner and recording artist, providing some modest chart entries in the 1990s.

In 2000 Ross organized a tour billed as the Supremes, although Wilson and Birdsong were not included, leading to negative press attention and low turnout. Ross also struggled with her personal life, and was arrested in 2002 for driving drunk and served two days in prison after being convicted in 2004. The 2000s also brought many rereleases of Ross's past solo albums, often with extended versions of songs. Everything Is Everything, Surrender (1971), and Touch Me in the Morning (1973) were among the titles rereleased, while Blue, shelved after its recording in 1972, made its debut in 2006. Ross also recorded I Love You, a collection of love songs inspired by family photographs, in 2006.

Ross was featured in 2008 as a guest speaker for the Houston, Texas-based Brilliant Lecture Series, and she performed numerous concerts throughout the United States and Europe in the late 2000s, including the annual Dutch concert event Symphonica in Rosso in 2009. She made headlines again in 2009 when it emerged that her fellow superstar and former collaborator Michael Jackson had named her as a guardian for his children. She continued to tour and perform into the 2010s, including with residencies in Las Vegas, Nevada. In 2012 she performed for President Barack Obama at the White House, despite having a broken ankle. In 2015 Motown released her album Sings Songs from the Wiz, featuring Ross's recordings of songs from the film version of The Wiz originally recorded in 1978 but left unreleased. Her twenty-fifth studio album, Thank You, was set for release in 2021.

Throughout her career Ross received many music honors, including twelve Grammy Award nominations, as well as Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations for her portrayal of Billie Holiday in Lady Sings the Blues. In 1976, Billboard magazine named her the Female Entertainer of the Century, and in 1988 she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with the Supremes. In 1993 the Guinness Book of World Records declared Ross the most successful female music artist in history with a total of eighteen American number-one singles: twelve with the Supremes and six as a solo artist. She also is one of the few celebrities to have two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame—one as a solo artist and the other as a member of the Supremes. Ross received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2007 Black Entertainment Television (BET) Awards and later that year was given a Kennedy Center Honor. In 2012 she was presented with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, in 2016 she was honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama, and in 2017 she earned an American Music Awards Lifetime Achievement Award.

Significance

Ross had a massive impact on the music industry across her long and influential career, becoming one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed artists of all time. Her path from a low-income-housing project to worldwide acclaim made her a potent symbol of the American Dream. Her talent and hard work made her a musical icon and trendsetter. The Supremes, led by Ross, surpassed the multitude of girl groups from the 1950s and 1960s and brought the Motown sound to White audiences and beyond. Their sophistication and glamour, with a touch of soul, served to redefine the look and sound of American popular music.

Bibliography

Adrahtas, Tom. Diana Ross: The American Dreamgirl—A Lifetime to Get Here. Bloomington: AuthorHouse, 2006. Print.

Clemente, John. Girl Groups: Fabulous Females That Rocked the World. Iola: Krause, 2000. Print.

Ifkovic, Ed. Diana’s Dogs: Diana Ross and the Definition of a Diva. Bloomington: iUniverse, 2007. Print.

Kellman, Andy. "Diana Ross: Biography." AllMusic, www.allmusic.com/artist/diana-ross-mn0000594665/biography. Accessed 22 July 2021.

Ross, Diana. Diana Ross: Going Back. Ed. Rosanne Shelnutt. New York: Universe, 2002. Print.

Ross, Diana. Secrets of a Sparrow: Memoirs. New York: Villard, 1993. Print.

"The Supremes Biography." Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum, 2016. Web. 29 Mar. 2016.

Taraborrelli, J. Randy. Diana Ross: A Biography. New York: Citadel, 2007. Print.