u/BlackOnyx1906

Mya Marie Harrison (/ˈmaɪə/;[4] born October 10, 1979),[1] known professionally as Mýa, is an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and actress. She was born in Washington, D.C. and studied ballet, jazz, and tap dance as a child. Her career began in television as a dance posse member on BET's Teen Summit. She signed with University Records, an imprint of Interscope Records to release her first album Mya(1998). The album was led by her first single, "It's All About Me" (featuring Sisqó), which peaked within the top ten of the Billboard Hot 100. Her subsequent collaborative singles, "Ghetto Supastar (That Is What You Are)" (with Pras and Ol' Dirty Bastard) and "Take Me There" (with Blackstreet and Mase), were also met with commercial success.

Mya Harrison, a native of Washington, D.C., is the eldest of three children. Her father Sherman "Hajji" Harrison is a singer and performs in an R&B band, Jump Street[13] and her mother Theresa worked as an accountant. She grew up in Prince George's County with her two younger brothers Chaz and Nijel.[14] In her youth, Mýa dealt with bullying growing up as a biracial young person with a Black father and a white mother.[15]

She started ballet classes shortly afterward 1992, followed by tap and jazz, but lost interest when she was eight.[14] At 12, she found videos of her dancing and her interest in dance was rekindled.[14][16]
Mýa studied tapes of Tony Award winner Savion Glover until she learned his routines and then joined the group T.W.A. (Tappers With Attitude). She was solo before heading to New York to study with Glover in a residency with the Dance Theater of Harlem. Soon after, she earned a reputation for improvisation and Glover gave her a solo spot during a Kennedy Center performance.[14][17]
Mýa subsequently appeared on BET's Teen Summitand began to teach dance to children when she was 14. She also had taken violin lessons since the fourth grade. Her strict upbringing emphasized the value of school and working hard to get good grades. When her father first heard her sing, he had her record demo tapes and took them to a club where he was playing. There he met A. Haqq Islam, President and CEO of University Music. Islam agreed to come to Mýa's home, where she sang him two En Voguesongs. Impressed with her audition, Islam signed her to a deal via his label and negotiated a distribution deal through Interscope Records.[14][16]

After graduating from Eleanor Roosevelt High Schoolin Greenbelt, Maryland at 16, she enrolled in the University of Maryland in speech communications. Mýa left college after one semester to focus on preparing her debut album.[14][18]

Tyler James Williams (born October 9, 1992) is an American actor and rapper. He began his career as a child actor, making several appearances on Saturday Night Live, Little Bill, and Sesame Street.[2] Williams later rose to prominence for playing the role of Chris Rock on the UPN/CW sitcom Everybody Hates Chris(2005–2009). Following this, he starred as songwriter Cyrus DeBarge in the Disney Channel film Let It Shine (2012), and Noah on the AMC horror drama television series The Walking Dead (2014–15).[3]

Williams was born in Westchester County, New York, and grew up in Yonkers, New York.[4] His mother, Angela Williams, is a counselor, and his father, Le'Roy Williams, is a teacher and retired police sergeant.[4][5]Williams has two younger siblings, both of whom are also actors: Tyrel Jackson Williams (b. 1997) and Tylen Jacob Williams (b. 2001).

Nicole Ari Parker Kodjoe (born October 7, 1970) is an American actress and model. She made her screen debut with a leading role in the critically acclaimed independent film The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love (1995) and went on to appear in Boogie Nights (1997), directed by Paul Thomas Anderson.

Parker was born on October 7, 1970, in Baltimore, Maryland.[1] She is the only child of her divorced parents, health care professional Susan Parker and dentist Donald Parker.[2] After briefly attending a Montessori school, Parker entered Roland Park Country School, where she stayed through high school.[3] At the age of 17, she won Best Actress in the state of Maryland's high school theater competition. She became a member of The Washington Ballet Company before earning an acting degree in 1993 from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts.[4]

Donny Hathaway—singer, pianist, producer, composer, and one of R&B’s strongest talents—was born Donny Edward Pitts on October 1, 1945, in Chicago, Illinois. Hathaway was raised in the Carr Square Housing Projects of St. Louis, Missouri, by his grandmother, Martha Pitts. At the age of three, Hathaway began singing in church choir alongside his grandmother, a professional gospel singer. By six years old, Hathaway was composing his own music, singing, and playing the piano professionally under the name “Donny Pitts, The Nation’s Youngest Gospel Singer.”

Hathaway was a known piano prodigy before reaching high school, and in 1964, he received a full scholarship to attend Howard University,where he joined Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity. While majoring in Music Theory and performing in the jazz group Ric Powell Trio, Hathaway worked as a session musician and songwriter for labels like Chess. His arrangements for The Staple Singers, Curtis Mayfield, and Aretha Franklin earned him a job at Curtom Records in 1969. There, he recorded his first single, “I Thank You, Baby,” a duet with June Conquest.

Later that year, Hathaway signed with Atlantic Records as a solo artist and released his debut single, “The Ghetto, Pt. 1.” The song reached No. 23 on the R&B charts and established Hathaway as a burgeoning force in music. His critically acclaimed LP Everything is Everything and hit single “This Christmas” followed in 1970. By 1971, Hathaway released his second full-length album, Donny Hathaway. Classics like “A Song For You” and “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother” would come to solidify his musical legacy for generations to come.

By 1972, Hathaway and Roberta Flackcollaborated on a series of duets. Their album, Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway, hit No. 3 on the pop charts and included “Where Is The Love?” which earned the pair the Grammy Award for Best Pop Performance by a Duo in 1973. That August, Hathaway’s album Live edged into the Top 20 and became Hathaway’s first and only gold album. Today, Live is considered one of the greatest live albums of all time. Aside from his work as a singer, Hathaway scored the feature film Come Back Charleston Blue and recorded the theme song for the television series Maude.

Amidst his growing success, Hathaway was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and was frequently hospitalized due to intense mood swings and depression. However, periods of mental clarity allowed Hathaway to record and release his final studio album, Extensions of a Man, in 1973. Songs like “Someday We’ll All Be Free” and “I Love You More Than You’ll Ever Know” secured spots on both the R&B and pop charts. Soon after the album’s release, Hathaway dropped from the public eye and sought treatment.

In 1978, Hathaway returned to the studio to record with Roberta Flack. “The Closer I Get To You” became the pair’s second No. 1 hit and inspired the recording of the second album of duets. However, on January 13, 1979, Hathaway was found dead outside of the Essex House in New York City, New York, after a fall from the window of his 15th-floor hotel room. Although investigators ruled his death a suicide, family and friends believe his death may have been an accident. Donny Hathaway was only 34 years old.

https://blackpast.org/african-american-history/hathaway-donny-1945-1979/

Lewis Eddy Myers (September 26, 1935 – February 19, 2013)[1], also known professionally as Lou Myersor alternately as Lou Leabengula Myers,[2] was an American actor and pianist.

Myers was born in Chesapeake, West Virginia, the son of Dorothy Louise Brown Myers and Otis Louis Myers, a coal miner who spoke fluent German. He joined the U.S. Air Force in 1951. He was discharged in 1953 and went on to earn a bachelor's degree in sociology from West Virginia State University and an MFA in theatre from NYU.[6][7]

Myers was typically typecast as a grumpy old man, but he appeared in many movies, plays, and television programs. He made his Broadway debut in 1975 as Reverend Mosely in the production The First Breeze of Summer, alongside Ethel Ayler, Moses Gunn, Bebe Drake, and Barbara Montgomery.[3] He joined them in recreating their roles for a television adaptation that aired on Great Performances in 1976.[4]
Myers was an original cast member of many August Wilson plays, including Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Fences, and The Piano Lesson.
He is perhaps best known as the feisty Mr. Vernon Gaines in the sitcom A Different World. Myers was also an accomplished pianist and founder/director of the Tshaka Ensemble Players in Africa.[5]

Shawn "Slim" Stockman[2][a] (born September 26, 1972)[1] is an American singer, songwriter and record producer. He is best known as a member of the vocal group Boyz II Men.[3] In addition to Boyz II Men, Stockman was a member of the group Black Men United. He was also a judge on the NBC television show The Sing-Off for five seasons (2009–2014)

Shawn Patrick Stockman,[5][6] a native of Southwest Philadelphia, started singing with the Philadelphia Boys Choir & Chorale at the age of 8.[7] He attended CAPA (Creative and Performing Arts High School) in South Philadelphia, where he met the other members of Boyz II Men, originally calling themselves Unique Attraction.[8]

Serena Jameka Williams (born September 26, 1981)[1] is an American professional tennis player. She was ranked as the world No. 1 in women's singles by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for 319 weeks (third-most of all time),[3] and finished as the year-end No. 1 five times. Williams won 73 WTA Tour–level singles titles, including 23 major women's singles titles—the most in the Open Era, and the second-most of all time. She is the only player to accomplish a Career Golden Slam in both singles and doubles, and the only player to have simultaneously held Olympic gold and all four major titles in both singles and doubles.[4][5]

Williams was born on September 26, 1981, in Saginaw, Michigan, to Oracene Price and Richard Williams. She is the youngest of Price's five daughters, after half-sisters Yetunde, Lyndrea, and Isha Price, and full sister Venus.[1] She also has at least seven paternal half-siblings.[12][13] When Serena and Venus were young, Richard moved the family to Compton, California, over the objections of his wife. Richard had studied sports success stories, and believed that the rough environment of Compton would toughen up Serena and Venus in preparation for their future tennis careers.[14] Richard home-schooled Serena and Venus, and Serena started playing tennis at the age of four.[15][16][17] While Serena's parents have been her official coaches, her other mentors have included Richard Williams, a Compton man who shared her father's name and subsequently founded The Venus and Serena Williams Tennis Tutorial Academy.[18]

When Williams was nine, the family moved from Compton to West Palm Beach, Florida,[15] so Serena and Venus could attend the tennis academy of Rick Macci, who provided her with additional coaching. Macci did not always agree with Richard's approach to coaching and training, but respected that "he treated his daughters like kids, allowed them to be little girls".[19] By 1991, Williams had a 46–3 record on the United States Tennis Association junior tour and was ranked No. 1 among under-10 players in Florida.[20][21] When Williams was 10, Richard stopped sending his daughters to national junior tennis tournaments, as he wanted them to "go slowly" and focus on school, and because he wanted to ensure they would not burn out before turning professional.[20] Experiences of racism also influenced this decision, as he had heard white parents talk about his daughters in a derogatory manner during tournaments.[22]
In 1995, when Williams was in the ninth grade, her father pulled his daughters out of Macci's academy and took over all coaching at their home.[23][24]

Michelle Doris Thomas (September 23, 1968 – December 23, 1998)[1][2] was an American actress. She played Justine Phillips on the NBC sitcom The Cosby Show (1988–1990), Myra Monkhouse on the ABC/CBS sitcom Family Matters (1993–1998), and Callie Rogers on the CBS soap opera The Young and the Restless (1998).[3]

Michelle Doris Thomas was born in Brookline, Massachusetts,[4] on September 23, 1968, to Phynjuar "Penwah" Thomas,[5] a stage actress, and musician father Dennis "Dee Tee" Thomas (1951–2021), a saxophonist and founding member of the band Kool & the Gang.[3] Thomas grew up in Montclair, New Jersey, and graduated from West Essex High School in 1987.[1][6]
As a child, she would accompany her mother to her theater rehearsals and performances.[7] Her mother was her first acting coach, and coached her throughout the course of her career.[3] A friend of her mother who had heard Thomas sing before had requested that she enter Miss Talented Teens.[8]Thomas was crowned Miss Talented Teen New Jersey at the state's Hal Jackson's Talented Teen pageant, and then in July 1984, at the age of 15, she was crowned Miss Talented Teen International in Montego Bay, Jamaica from among 35 state and national representatives.[9][10][11]

Ricardo Bell (born September 18, 1967)[1][2] is an American singer and rapper, best known as one of the founding members of R&B/pop group New Edition, and the lead singer of Bell Biv DeVoe. As a solo artist, Bell released the album Ricardo Campanain 2000.

The youngest of eleven children, Bell was born in Roxbury, Boston, Massachusetts and grew up in the Orchard Park Projects.[3] He began his career singing with close friend Ralph Tresvant in the group Ricky and Ralph. Later, Bell, along with Michael Bivins, Bobby Brown, Ralph Tresvant, and Ronnie DeVoeformed New Edition. The group began a career in 1978 that has spanned more than 40 years.[4] After the departure of Brown, Johnny Gill joined the group in the mid-1980s. Before Gill joined the group, Bell was originally the oldest member of New Edition. After the group recorded the album "Heartbreak", Bell was given the chance to go solo but opted instead to form Bell Biv DeVoe, with Bivins and DeVoe.[4][5]
The "best kept secret" originally gained the respect of the industry when record producer Jimmy Jam had the idea for the spin-off group Bell Biv DeVoe with Bell as the lead singer. BBD, as the group is commonly known, was the first to integrate elements of Rap and R&B consistently, calling their style "Hip-hop smoothed out on an R&B tip with a pop feel appeal to it." BBD's 1990 debut established Bell as a lead singer capable of chart topping success. [6]Though Bell had primarily performed as a backup vocalist with New Edition, he emerged as one of the most utilized voices on singles released by the group in the 1990s. With the exception of the ensemble songs "Hot2Nite" and "Hit Me Off", and the Brown-led "You Don't Have to Worry," Bell performed lead or co-lead on the remainder of the group's chartingsingles.
With Bell Biv DeVoe and New Edition, Bell has over two dozen TV and film performances including Knight Rider, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, New York Undercover, Family Matters, the movie Krush Groove, and numerous music, variety and awards programs.[7]
Bell sang the BBD hit "Poison" along with Ne-Yo at the 2009 BET Awards.[8]
In 2008, Bell, as a member of New Edition, was the recipient of the Golden Note Award at ASCAP's 21st Annual Rhythm & Soul Music Awards.[9] In 2017, Bell Biv DeVoe released a new album called Three Stripes; it was the trio's first album in 15 years.[10]

Jayme Lawson (born September 19, 1997)[1] is an American actress. She is best known for her roles as Mayor Bella Reál in The Batman (2022) and Pearline in Sinners (2025).

Lawson grew up in the Washington, D.C. Metro Areaas the youngest of six siblings. She attended Duke Ellington School of the Arts and spent summers attending theatre camp. Upon graduation, Lawson moved to New York City to attend Juilliard School. Lawson has cited her love of poetry and literature of the Harlem Renaissance as an early influence, as well as the talent of actresses Phylicia Rashad and Lucille Ball.[2][3]

Babs Olusanmokun (born 1984 or 1985)[1] is a Nigerian actor based in the United States.[2][3] He is best known for playing Dr. Joseph M'Benga in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (2022–present) and Jamisin Dune[4] (2021) and Dune: Part Two (2024). He also appeared in the video game Max Payne 3 as Serrano, a role that he both voiced and performed motion capture for.[5]

Olusanmokun was born in Lagos, Nigeria, and is based in New York.[3]
Olusanmokun is fluent in English, French, Yoruba and Portuguese, and is a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt and champion.[6][7]