Biography
Born in 1977 in Maryland and raised in the D.C. area, gospel vocalist Y'anna Monique Crawley entered a household saturated with music, thanks to her father, a Reverend who also sang, along with aunts already established in the industry. From her teenage years onward she supplied backing vocals on recordings by artists ranging from Jennifer Lopez to Angie Stone, yet at seventeen the arrival of her first child forced her to balance those ambitions against everyday financial pressures. She maintained her persistence, however, and in 2009 claimed victory in the second season of BET’s gospel competition Sunday Best, a program that reached millions of viewers and immediately drew label interest. That exposure yielded her debut album, The Promise, issued in 2010, after which she continued issuing singles while extending her work into songwriting for fellow performers, screen roles, and fitness instruction. In the mid-2010s she moved to Atlanta to strengthen ties across the broader entertainment field, later contributing to the soundtrack of the 2017 film A Question of Faith and releasing the singles “We Need You” in 2017 and “In You” in 2018.