Diana Ross

Diana Ross stands without question as an icon who first attained fame as part of the Supremes, the vocal ensemble that evolved during the 1960s from aspiring performers into Motown frontrunners and eventually one of history’s most triumphant recording ensembles. Departing the lineup in 1970, the vocalist quickly scored solo victories that produced more than two dozen individual Top 40 pop entries. These encompass “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” (1970), “Love Hangover” (1976), “Upside Down” (1980), and “Endless Love” (1981), number-one standards spanning pop-soul, disco, and adult-contemporary ballads. Regardless of genre or sentiment, Ross has projected extraordinary elegance and composure, maintaining an authentic link to her songs while projecting resilience amid the most anguished romantic narratives throughout her extensive catalog. Honored with twelve Grammy nominations for performances both alongside and apart from the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame-inducted Supremes, and recognized with an Academy Award nomination for her lead portrayal in Lady Sings the Blues, she later received the Recording Academy’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Her ongoing six-decade run received tribute via the 2019 documentary Diana Ross: Her Life, Love and Legacy, after which she issued her twenty-fifth solo album, Thank You, in 2021.

Except for a short interval spent in Bessemer, Alabama, Diane Ernestine Earle Ross grew up in Detroit, the city of her birth. In 1959, soon after relocating with her family to the Brewster-Douglass Housing Projects, she formed the Primettes with Florence Ballard and Mary Wilson; the group later became the Supremes. Between 1964 and 1969 the Motown act reached the pinnacle of the Billboard Hot 100 twelve times, starting with “Where Did Our Love Go.” They duplicated that achievement on Grammy-nominated recordings such as “Baby Love” and “Stop in the Name of Love,” extended it with the enduring favorite “Reflections”—at which juncture they appeared as Diana Ross & the Supremes—and ended the sequence with “Someday We’ll Be Together.” Throughout this span the Supremes ranked among the era’s highest-selling groups.

Prepared for individual success, Ross gave her final performance with the Supremes in January 1970. Motown delivered the debut solo album Diana Ross that June. Almost entirely composed and produced by Nickolas Ashford and Valerie Simpson, the set generated chart singles via “Reach Out and Touch (Somebody’s Hand)” together with a cover of “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough,” already a hit for Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell. The latter track topped Billboard’s Hot 100 and R&B lists while earning Ross a Grammy nomination for Best Contemporary Vocal Performance, Female. The three subsequent LPs Everything Is Everything, the soundtrack to the television special Diana!, and Surrender (all 1971 and 1972) preceded the chart-topping soundtrack Lady Sings the Blues (1972) for the Motown-produced film. In her acting debut Ross portrayed Billie Holiday and earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress.

Touch Me in the Morning, the Marvin Gaye duets album Diana & Marvin, and Last Time I Saw Him (all 1973) arrived next. The strongest single from these projects, “Touch Me in the Morning” itself—penned by Michael Masser and Ron Miller—became Ross’ second solo number one and likewise drew a Grammy best-performance nomination, this time in the pop category. Live at Caesars Palace (1974), her initial solo concert document, bridged the gap before the romantic drama Mahogany, another major Motown film starring Ross. Written by Masser and Gerry Goffin, the movie’s “Theme from Mahogany (Do You Know Where You’re Going To)” returned her to the summit of the pop charts and received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song.

Ross’ airy delivery and instinctive dramatics aligned seamlessly with disco. She navigated another fluid shift via the Marilyn McLeod/Pamela Sawyer composition “Love Hangover,” produced by Hal Davis. One of the style’s signature long-form works, it ascended to the summit of Billboard’s disco, R&B, and pop charts, propelling its parent album Diana Ross (1976) into the upper reaches of the matching R&B and pop LP charts and securing Ross’ fourth solo performance-related Grammy nomination. She followed with Baby, It’s Me (1977), recorded with Richard Perry shortly before the producer rejuvenated the Pointer Sisters. Among the album’s three charting singles appeared the dance-oriented “Your Love Is So Good for Me,” which again placed Ross in contention for a best-performance Grammy. Ross (1978) came afterward, divided evenly between fresh tracks and refurbished versions of earlier unreleased material.

Ross continued balancing endeavors with The Wiz (1978), an expansive cinematic adaptation of the Broadway musical, itself a reimagining of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz situated in an African-American framework. Another Motown production, the film achieved success beyond conventional box-office metrics, its cultural resonance expanding over subsequent years. Its gold-certified soundtrack included a rendition of “Ease on Down the Road”—featuring Ross alongside co-star Michael Jackson and co-production from Quincy Jones—that topped the disco chart and earned a Grammy nomination. Ross’ dance-floor momentum persisted with another Ashford & Simpson–written and –produced collection, The Boss (1979), and the ensuing Chic Organization partnership Diana (1980). The former marked her first solo gold album in the United States; the latter, driven by the number-one pop single “Upside Down” and number-five follow-up “I’m Coming Out,” surpassed it by attaining platinum status, another solo milestone. “Upside Down” became her ninth Grammy-nominated recording. That same month the ceremony aired, Motown released a second hybrid LP of new and restored archival material, To Love Again (1981).

Ross departed Motown for RCA, yet not before cutting “Endless Love,” composed by duet partner Lionel Richie for the motion picture of identical title. A number-one entry on the Hot 100, R&B, and adult-contemporary charts, it reappeared on Ross’ otherwise self-produced RCA debut Why Do Fools Fall in Love (also 1981) and received two Grammy nominations: Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal plus one of the “Big Four,” Record of the Year. Like Diana, Why Do Fools Fall in Love reached platinum. Ross maintained a near-annual schedule of RCA releases. Silk Electric (1982) supplied “Muscles,” a Top Ten pop, Grammy-nominated single written and produced by Michael Jackson. She next collaborated with fellow Detroiter Ray Parker, Jr. and Gary Katz on another album titled Ross (1983), issued the same year she delivered two landmark concerts in New York City’s Central Park. Swept Away (1984) attained gold certification thanks to the Top 20 title track and number-ten hit “Missing You,” cut respectively with Daryl Hall and Arthur Baker plus Lionel Richie and James Anthony Carmichael. Her RCA period concluded with Eaten Alive (1985) and Red Hot Rhythm & Blues (1987), spotlighted by “Eaten Alive,” which included backing vocals from Michael Jackson and additional writing from Barry and Maurice Gibb.

In 1988 Ross and Supremes colleagues Florence Ballard and Mary Wilson entered the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. That same year she negotiated a fresh contract with Motown and returned to the imprint via Workin’ Overtime (1989), a new-jack-swing-inflected project helmed by Chic’s Nile Rodgers. Its title track reached the Top Ten on the R&B chart. The Force Behind the Power (1991) inaugurated an extended partnership with producer Peter Asher, though Ross also pursued chart success throughout the decade by teaming with seasoned studio figures and rising hitmakers ranging from Arif Mardin and Nick Martinelli to Al B. Sure! and Chuckii Booker. “No Matter What You Do,” a duet with Sure!, became her final Top Ten R&B single.

Through the close of the 1990s Ross delivered two further studio albums, Take Me Higher (1995) and Every Day Is a New Day (1999), yet devoted most of the decade to establishing herself as a heritage performer. She marked the twentieth anniversary of Lady Sings the Blues with a Ritz Theatre concert preserved as Stolen Moments: The Lady Sings...Jazz and Blues. Less than three weeks later she recorded Christmas in Vienna alongside Plácido Domingo and José Carreras. Around that period she issued the memoir Secrets of a Sparrow, paired with the career-spanning box set Forever Diana: Musical Memoirs. The single-disc anthology One Woman: The Ultimate Collection distilled the box and proved especially popular in the U.K., where it topped the pop chart en route to quadruple-platinum certification.

The 2000s opened with a Supremes tour featuring Ross alongside later members Lynda Laurence and Scherrie Payne, then continued with numerous prominent solo appearances and honors. Among the highlights, Ross performed “God Bless America” at the 2001 U.S. Open women’s singles final and, two weeks afterward, sang the identical song at the first professional baseball contest in New York—at Shea Stadium—following the September 11 attacks. Duets with Rod Stewart and Westlife preceded Blue (2006), a standards project shelved for three-and-a-half decades and originally conceived as the successor to Lady Sings the Blues. Shortly thereafter arrived I Love You (also 2006), Ross’ first studio album in seven years. Produced by Peter Asher, the collection comprised interpretations of classic love songs, among them Burt Bacharach and Hal David’s “The Look of Love,” Harry Nilsson’s “Remember,” and Heatwave’s “Always and Forever.” Her contributions to the performing arts were subsequently celebrated at the Kennedy Center Honors, and she received Lifetime Achievement Awards from both the Recording Academy and BET. Throughout the 2010s Ross toured steadily and undertook multiple Las Vegas residencies. President Barack Obama presented her the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2016. Motown continued releasing catalog collections, including Diamond Diana: The Legacy Collection (2017). The documentary Diana Ross: Her Life, Love and Legacy concluded the decade. Contemporary dance remixes by Eric Kupper were assembled for Supertonic: Mixes (2020), which contained several tracks that reached the summit of Billboard’s club chart. In June 2021 Ross unveiled “Thank You” ahead of her twenty-fifth solo album. Crafted with Jack Antonoff, Thank You also incorporated collaborations with Jimmy Napes, Tayla Parx, and Spike Stent. The following year Ross partnered with Tame Impala on the party anthem “Turn Up the Sunshine,” featured on the soundtrack for the animated feature Minions: The Rise of Gru.