A joyful noise: five incredible music makers at the top of their game

BLACK music has been called the best music in the world. It is certainly among the most diverse, the most emotional, the most joyful, the most satisfying. In this issue we celebrate Black music, and the Black musicians, vocalists, lyricists, composers, producers and others who make it possible for us to enjoy this tremendous gift.

The people who make the music are indeed special, for they touch the lives of millions. The Grammy Award-winning artists we feature here represent different generations and genres, and collectively they represent some of the best that Black music has to offer.

Smokey Robinson gained fame as the voice and pen that made the Miracles and Motown a success in the '50s and '60s. To his credit are 36 Top 40 hits, a Grammy Living Legend Award, and berths in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters' Hall of Fame. "I'm blessed," Robinson says of his music longevity. "And I respect it, and I don't take it for granted. I don't trip on Smokey Robinson. I never lose my focus on the Lord, and I can't thank Him enough."

His distinctive tenor/falsetto voice has held up over the decades, he says, because he takes care of himself. "Because your voice is your instrument, and it's what you use the most," he says. "So if your body is rundown, and if you're not taking care of yourself, then the voice is going to go. It's going to suffer. I take care of myself ... People don't come to see you if you are hoarse."

In June, Robinson will release Timeless Love, a new recording of romantic jazz, big band and pop standards. In addition, he is busy with his food company, which offers four products in 4,800 supermarkets across the country. Yet, music is Robinson's first love. His a advice to those aspiring for success in the music industry: "You've got to love it with a passion. People only see the success. They don't see the hard knocks and the letdowns, the doors slammed in your face. If you are prepared emotionally and mentally to withstand all that, go for it. It's a tough business."

But not tough enough to sidetrack Yolanda Adams from her dream. The lifelong Houston resident began singing as a child when she was exposed to gospel greats, jazz and Stevie Wonder. Her real breakthrough came when she signed with Elektra Records and released the 1999 groundbreaking, Grammy-winning Mountain High ... Valley Low CD, which preached to the choir but also to urban music fans. Adams crossed over without abandoning her spiritual message and has taken her praise music to millions around the world.

Whether she sings to a church crowd of 300 or to a packed stadium of 20,000, the vibrant entertainer gives "100 percent." Her Day By Day CD has dropped four hit singles, with more to come. Adams also is among the dozens of celebrities who are recording The Bible Experience. (Blair Underwood is the voice of Jesus; Denzel Washington is Solomon; Kirk Franklin is Peter; Angela Bassett is Esther.)

"You have to really have the tenacity, the patience, because it's all about God's timing," she says of success in gospel music. "It has to be done in the spirit of excellence."

That has always been Kelly Rowland's mantra. She told her kindergarten teacher that she wanted to be a singer after she saw Whitney Houston on television singing "The Greatest Love of All." "I wanted to sing like Whitney Houston in that red dress," recalls Rowland, who has enjoyed the sale of more than 40 million records with Destiny's Child. "And I have never, ever forgotten that song. I learned it backward, forward, sideways. The video still brings chills to me. When you wish and pray for something as a kid, you never know what blessings God will give you."

Kelly is excited about her upcoming solo project, which she says will reflect personal experiences. ("Dilemma," her duet with Nelly from her 2002 Simply Deep, won a Grammy.) Now "happily single" after ending an engagement, Kelly says she prefers a guy with "great confidence, a strong man spiritually, one who is grounded, spontaneous, humorous."

While Kelly dreamed of performing when in kindergarten, Ciara's vision of a music career emerged when, at 14, she saw Destiny's Child performing on television. At that young, critical age, she had serious decisions to make. "I was really good at cheerleading, and I was good at track and thinking about college," she recalls. "It was a defining period in my life. I had to sacrifice a lot of things."

But it paid off with a hit record, Goodies, and it jump-started a promising music career that already has led to an MTV movie role and an endorsement deal for a clothing company. At age 20, the Grammy winner recently moved out of her parents' home into her own condo.

Ciara also is experiencing a downside of music fame. She recently announced that her much-publicized relationship with another talented, young recording artist, Bow Wow, has ended. But she's not letting that sidetrack her career. She is reading scripts and in the recording studio finalizing her second recording. "I just want to make it Goodies times two," she says. "I truly believe that the sky is the limit and I can do whatever I put my mind to."