Stokley

Born in St. Paul, Minnesota, on July 15, 1967, Stokley Williams grew up with a father renowned for his scholarship in African studies, prompting the future musician to take up percussion at the age of four. In the early 1980s he formed Mint Condition alongside several high school classmates, handling lead vocals and drums for the ensemble. Local gigs continued for years until Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis caught the band at a Minneapolis showcase in 1989; the pair’s New Jack Swing sound prompted the producers to secure them a contract. The resulting 1991 debut, Meant to Be Mint, yielded the hit singles “(Breaking My Heart) Pretty Brown Eyes” and “Forever in Your Eyes,” and the group maintained a consistent release schedule from the early 1990s into the twenty-first century. Williams quickly established himself as a versatile session artist, supplying vocals and percussion by 1995 to recordings by Janet Jackson, Sounds of Blackness, Johnny Gill, and Color Me Badd, later adding Prince, Elton John, and Toni Braxton to his credits. A 2011 duet with Kelly Price, “Not My Daddy,” brought a Grammy nomination for Best R&B Performance. He also contributed production and vocals to Wale’s 2013 album The Gifted and to The Album About Nothing in 2015. In June 2017, after an extended wait, Williams issued his first solo project, Introducing Stokley, on Concord under the simplified name Stokley.