lit a candle 8 Sept 2026Gone too soon on I-65. She spoke up about diabetes and really meant it, wanted to help Black communities take it seriously. That work mattered.
Their story
Angela Laverne Brown was born on 18 December 1961 in Columbia, South Carolina, the only child of hospital technician Iona Williams (née Brown) and Bobby Williams, a lawyer's assistant and gospel singer. Music filled the house: her mother sang at home and her father sang gospel and blues locally. She…
Angela Laverne Brown was born on 18 December 1961 in Columbia, South Carolina, the only child of hospital technician Iona Williams (née Brown) and Bobby Williams, a lawyer's assistant and gospel singer. Music filled the house: her mother sang at home and her father sang gospel and blues locally. She attended W.A. Perry Middle School and C.A. Johnson High School, and she sang her first solo in the choir at First Nazareth Baptist Church in Columbia.
In 1979, with childhood friends Gwendolyn Chisolm and Cheryl Cook, she formed The Sequence. After meeting Sugar Hill Records CEO Sylvia Robinson backstage at a Sugarhill Gang show, the trio became the label's first female act. Performing as Angie B., she helped cut "Funk You Up" (December 1979), an early original hip-hop single that later became one of the most sampled records in the genre. The Sequence released albums into the mid-1980s before a royalties dispute with Sugar Hill ended the contract. She briefly worked toward solo work and at New York's Kiss-FM, and she took the surname Stone from her marriage to rapper Lil' Rodney C! of Funky Four Plus One.
Through the late 1980s and mid-1990s she wrote, sang, and networked across R&B. She joined Vertical Hold (after an earlier It's Us lineup), whose 1993 album A Matter of Time and single "Seems You're Much Too Busy" placed on R&B charts. She played saxophone on Lenny Kravitz's Let Love Rule Tour (1990), mentored newer talent while writing for MCA, and helped complete material for D'Angelo's Brown Sugar, later touring as a background vocalist and co-writing songs including work associated with Voodoo. A Japan-only DeVox project featuring Angie B. Stone drew Arista A&R interest.
As Angie Stone she released Black Diamond (1999) on Arista. The album went gold in the US and UK. "No More Rain (In This Cloud)" topped Adult R&B for ten weeks and won Soul Train Lady of Soul honors alongside Best Solo R&B/Soul New Artist. Moving to Clive Davis's J Records, she issued Mahogany Soul (2001), another gold set whose "Wish I Didn't Miss You" and "Brotha" became signature hits. Stone Love (2004) and Stax-era The Art of Love & War (2007) followed. The latter became her only No. 1 on Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums. She earned three Grammy nominations ("More Than a Woman" with Joe; "U-Haul"; "Baby" with Betty Wright). Later albums included Unexpected, Rich Girl, Dream, Covered in Soul, Full Circle, and final studio set Love Language (2023). Worldwide solo sales are widely cited above five million. In 2024 she featured on Damon Little's gospel Airplay No. 1 "No Stressing," and she released late single "All I'm Missing." Some press called her a queen of neo-soul. Treat that as a press nickname, not a formal title.
Screen and stage work paralleled the records: The Hot Chick (2002), The Fighting Temptations (2003), Broadway's Matron Mama Morton in Chicago (2003), Pastor Brown, Ride Along, TV One's R&B Divas: Atlanta, VH1's Celebrity Fit Club, and the Girlfriends theme. She spoke publicly about Type 2 diabetes (diagnosed 1999) as a F.A.C.E. Diabetes spokeswoman, founded Angel Stripes to support youth arts and senior voting rights, and in late 2024 said she planned to sue Universal Music Group over unpaid royalties.
Stone married Lil' Rodney C! in 1983. Daughter Diamond was born in 1984. They divorced in the late 1980s. She partnered with D'Angelo from 1994 to 1999. Their son Michael Archer Jr. (musician Swayvo Twain) was born in 1997. A later engagement to manager Ashanti Graves ended amid reported infidelity claims around the R&B Divas period. She became a grandmother through Diamond's children (noted in secondary profiles for 2008 and 2012). Those grandchildren's names are not consistently verified in primary obituaries, so they are not named here.
On 1 March 2025, after a Mardi Gras concert in Mobile, Alabama, the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter carrying Stone and bandmates overturned on Interstate 65 near Montgomery and was struck by a Freightliner Cascadia truck while passengers tried to exit. Alabama authorities said she was the only fatality and was pronounced dead at the scene at age 63. The New York Times separately quoted her agent, Deborah Champagne, saying she died in a hospital after the crash. Public facts here follow the Alabama Highway Patrol wording via AP, and note the agent wording as an alternate report. Memorials were held 14 March 2025 at Word of Faith Cathedral in Austell, Georgia, and 15 March 2025 at First Nazareth Baptist Church in Columbia. Find a Grave lists burial at Memorial Gardens of Columbia. Streaming of her catalog surged more than 1,000 percent in the week of her death. In September 2025 her children filed a wrongful-death suit alleging she was alive after the van overturned and that the truck impact caused her death. She remains a bridge figure between early female hip-hop and the neo-soul generation that remade R&B at the turn of the millennium.
Biography adapted from EN Wikipedia; AP; NYT; Guardian; Find a Grave; theangiestone.com; Eli Lilly F.A.C.E. Diabetes..
In their own words
“I'm an only child, so my dad and my mom are my life, and when I was a kid I'd look up to my dad. He was very influential in what I wanted to do.”
On family musical roots. Associated Press interview, 1999, quoted in the AP 2025 obituary.
“When I was first diagnosed with diabetes, I was in total denial about my disease and its impact on my life.”
Launching F.A.C.E. Diabetes advocacy. Eli Lilly / PR Newswire, 2008.
“I feel complete. I have a new love, a new album, a new outlook and a newfound joy.”
Reflecting on career and health turnaround. AP interview, 2007, quoted in the AP 2025 obituary.
“I've been in the business since 1979. I've grudged and drudged. ... Now I can finally say I feel I've arrived and mean it.”
Same 2007 AP interview context, quoted with the brief's ellipsis. Not expanded beyond the sourced excerpt.
“Never in a million years did we ever expect to get this horrible news. We are still trying to process and are completely heartbroken.”
Children Diamond and Michael Archer, statement via SRG Group. AP, March 2025.
“Angie was an example for black women and girls everywhere.”
Family memorial statement on theangiestone.com, 2025.
Photos
7Angie Stone, 31 July 2019, Sister Circle Live appearance
Jul 2019 · by People Forever
Angie Stone live, 2010 (Berns / 2010 tour era performance still)
by People Forever
Angie Stone, 1997, early solo-era portrait
by People Forever
Angie Stone performing, 2010
by People Forever
Yes. That song is sampled on records we still hear today. She made space for all of us.