00:00When I was in high school, Albie Short had an album with the song Night and Day on it
00:06and If I'm Not Your Lover, and that was the music that not only we fell in love to, but
00:12we make love to.
00:13R&B, at that moment specifically, it was starting to get the hip hop edge to Akeem Sweat and
00:21Mary J. Blige.
00:22She had the title of Queen of Hip Hop Soul, so I saw it progress where hip hop became
00:29a part of R&B for a while.
00:31R. Kelly brought in different things.
00:33His subject matter was wherever he wanted to take it, like he talked about doing it in
00:37the kitchen or, you know, just bump and grind and those things and kind of intertwined to
00:42become what we have now.
00:44I don't know if I could totally put a finger on exactly what R&B is, but it definitely has
00:51the elements of some of the things from the past and whatever was created freshly now.
00:56One attribute that I would change about R&B, I love, like, different ways of approaching
01:03the songs.
01:04Like, in certain eras, they would talk about, I always love my mama, what's a family reunion.
01:11They would sing about me and Mrs. Jones, they write about whatever, so that's what I would
01:15change and just the instrumentation.
01:19I think my father would always remind me to be confident and believe in me.
01:25Whether I was on a basketball court, on a film set, on a stage, there ain't nobody better
01:30than you.
01:31Like, that's what he was telling me.
01:33That didn't mean, like, I treat people less than, but that meant to go out there and believe
01:37in you.
01:38Man, I've had so many great experiences at the Essence Festival.
01:42I'm excited because it's always a super dope crowd, and now I'm bringing more people, more
01:47bands, more music.
01:49I got new music.
01:50Man, I'm just looking forward to what we're going to create.
01:52It's just going to be fun.
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