The Grammy Award-winning singer Mary J Blige, who is the ultimate Queen of Hip-Hop Soul, and one of the best-selling R&B divas since the 90s era, showed the real strength of a woman, when she performed live at ‘Kew the Music’, at the Royal Botanic Gardens, London on Sunday 16 July.
Blige was the final act at the week-long festival, which featured a host of artists including All Saints, Passenger, James and supporting acts on the night for Mary – Lauren Faith and Sir The Baptist.
Share My World, You Remind Me, No more Pain, Be Happy, her most recent releases Thick of It and Strength of a Woman were just a few of the best-selling hits, which Blige sang from a selection of world-wide albums having successfully amassed sales of more than 50 million since the release of What’s the 411?.
Throughout the performance, Blige hinted at her trials and tribulations and her fans in turn showed her real love and admiration listening attentively to the inspirational messages, whilst singing along to her most famous hits. During the performance Blige spoke about her influences and the inspiration behind her music, before dedicating the song Everything to her fans and God:
Blige said: ”I want to specifically dedicate this song to London, because a long time ago in 1991 when I first started in the music industry, I didn’t know what was gonna happen. But God sent me you and he said – Mary there are a bunch of people out there that are just like you, with some of the same issues like you and they want to show you how much they love you.”
Blige has released 15 albums over her 20-year reign as the Queen of Hip-Hop Soul, which included her most recent studio album Strength of a Woman, which also shares the same title as her new single.
Mary J Blige, is renowned for pouring her heart out to the world through music, and for not being afraid to speak out about issues from relationships to friendships, which is somewhat a reflection of the world that we all live in today. I look forward to many more heartfelt albums and great music.
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