By: Erica M. Ponder
It’s so hard to say goodbye, especially to a talent so rare and enticing. Eight-time Grammy winner, singer and songwriter Anita Baker has announced an upcoming farewell tour in 2018 on Twitter New Years Day.
sO Much 2 CELEBRATE with you #2018. 60th Bday in 25 days👑… Farewell 🎶Concert 🎹Series, beginning in March… We'll paint pictures together 2 last a Lifetime… "Let's Party!" #OneLastTime🎤abxo❤ damn… "Where does the time go?! pic.twitter.com/dMQpRgmTLY — Anita Baker (@IAMANITABAKER) January 1, 2018
Baker has announced on Twitter that the tour will kickoff in March.
We get discouraged, fatigued… Not by You😊 & The Music🎁… but by all "The Extra", nonsense. But… God is Good… & My Cup is Running OVAh & We are gonna have "A CELEBRATION🎈🎉🎊 hamMERcy/YESSlawd♥️ pic.twitter.com/Y7Smm0PGDD — Anita Baker (@IAMANITABAKER) January 3, 2018
Known for her beautiful contralto voice, Baker has made her stamp in R&B history several times, giving us hits like Sweet Love, No One in the World and Caught Up in the Rapture. After being in the industry for over 30 years, Anita Baker has inspired some of our favorites, like Toni Braxton and Beyoncé. It’s safe to say she will definitely be missed.
Although Baker’s gift is indeed unique, her background is similar to so many other talents in this industry.
”My story is a typical one,” she once revealed in a 1986 New York Times interview. ”I’m a product of Detroit’s inner city, from a single-parent home with four brothers and sisters. I started singing in church when I was 12, but in little storefront churches, not big city churches. For me that was crucial because the congregations in those storefront churches consisted mainly of old people who had migrated from the South, and the services and the music had an easy country spontaneity. If someone in the back row wanted to moan the last verse of a hymn while the minister came to the podium, it was okay.”
Cheers to a career worth celebrating. Thank you, Miss Baker, for giving us YOU for all of these years. Your music has blessed multiple generations, and will continue to do so in years to come!