Jazmine Sullivan

Jazmine, a Philadelphia native is a native of Philadelphia, and was raised in the city. Pam her mother is a former back-up singer at Philadelphia International Records. Her father offered her the position of curator at the Historic Strawberry Mansion. She together with her family later made the move to the historic iconic. She was a graduate in 2005 of the Philadelphia High School for the Creative and Performing Arts in which she was an instructor of vocal music. Sullivan was first singing in the kids' chorus as a contralto later she joined the adult chorus a couple of years after that. Sullivan was not exposed to secular music. She recalls when she was 11 when someone wanted her to sing as a soloist at church. But, she wasn't fully ready. "Then the time came that McDonald's had a competition for kids in major cities I had the opportunity to sing 'Accept What God Does' on Showtime in the Apollo and the audience responded really well". She was just 13 when she performed along in a duet with Stevie Wonder for his grandson's birthday. Sullivan was signed initially to Jive Records at the age 15. The label initially signed Sullivan to Jive Records when she was 15. She recorded an entire album but this album never saw release. Sullivan was eventually dropped from the record label. Missy Elliott was her producer for several songs from her first album. One of them is "Backstabbers" performed by Timbaland and Timbaland, which Elliott composed, was a one of the highlights of their collaboration.