Jazmine Sullivan

Jazmine, a Philadelphia native, was born and raised there. Pam her mother has been a backup singer in the past at Philadelphia International Records. At the age of five, old, her father got in the role of curator for the city's Historic Strawberry Mansion in the Strawberry Mansion section, and her family moved into the historical landmark. In 2005 she graduated from Philadelphia High School for the Creative and Performing Arts as the vocal music major. Sullivan began singing in the children's chorus as a contralto, before joining the adult choir just a couple of years after that. Sullivan did not get exposed to the world of secular music for the first time. "I started singing as a soloist at church and a person wanted me to sign up to gospel records at the age of 11. However, I was not ready for the task," she says. "Then the time came that McDonald's held a contest for kids in major cities I was invited to perform 'Accept what God Does' on Showtime at the Apollo and the audience was very enthusiastic". She was just 13 when she sang to Stevie Wonder for his grandson's birthday. Sullivan was signed initially to Jive Records at the age fifteen. When she was 15 She was signed by Jive Records. The label recorded her entire album there, but it was not made available for release. Sullivan was ultimately eliminated from the record label. Missy Elliott was the producer on a couple of tracks that were on their debut album. One of them was "Backstabbers" from Timbaland, which Elliott composed was one of Sullivan's top tracks.