H.E.R. has four Grammys, including one for song of the year in 2020. Now, the R&B songstress has earned her first Oscar after winning an Academy Award for Best Original Song in the film, Judas and the Black Messiah. The ballad, "Fight for You" was co-written and produced alongside Tiara Thomas and D'Mile.
The 23-year-old is now halfway to earning the coveted "EGOT," which is when an artist is awarded an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony.
H.E.R spent the introductory period of her career working to keep her identity under wraps. Releasing an album with just seven songs, no biography, and only a mysterious full-body silhouette on the cover, H.E.R. had people buzzing: Who is this person? What is this music? Why won’t she show her face? But it wasn’t all just a gimmick. While she went to great lengths to remain lowkey, her jig was up once Rihanna, Janet Jackson, Drake, and Alicia Keys sang her praises.
Today, H.E.R. is almost entirely shedding the secrecy, though she does still gaze at her adoring fans from many a pair of stylish sunglasses (We’re not sure we’ll ever see the day that she doesn’t perform without them). It’s almost ironic, actually, that as her name is an acronym for "Having Everything Revealed." Hiding one’s identity so that her craft does the talking, or in other words, reveals nothing so as to reveal everything. Read on to learn more about the 22-year-old rising star poised to have a huge night at the Grammys.
She keeps a low profile.
In modes of incognito similar to the wigged Sia and the masked Pussy Riot, H.E.R. would prefer to keep her identity concealed—though not for reasons like her fellow musicians (for Sia, it’s to stay mysterious; for the feminist protest punk rockers, it’s so they don’t get arrested). For H.E.R., she prefers anonymity to celebrity, because she would rather let the music speak for itself.
With her debut album, Volume 1, and the follow-up, Volume 2, she teased only her silhouette on their covers. Since then, her identity has been revealed. According to Billboard, fans figured out who she was after digging through SoundCloud, with Janet Jackson and Drake both raving about her and revealing H.E.R. identity on social media. Still, she continues to flex her extensive collection of shades on and off the stage à la Sir Elton John.
H.E.R.'s real name is Gabriella Wilson.
Born Gabriella Wilson, she goes by Gabi or her stage name, H.E.R. An acronym that stands for Having Everything Revealed, it’s an ironic moniker for someone who would rather remain unknown. But we’ll let her explain.
“I reveal who I am and my stories and my emotions, and music is an outlet for me. But it’s all revealed through my music and my message. Even though I don’t show my face and I don’t tell people who I am or more about me, it’s—really, you get to know who I am in my music,” she explained in a radio show interview.
In a 2018 interview with Interview, though, her true identity was neither confirmed nor denied despite the fact that there's "little doubt" H.E.R. and Wilson are the same person. As the magazine put it, her “legion of fans” didn’t care about her real name. They only cared about her brilliant music.
She got her big break on Radio Disney’s Next Big Thing in 2009.
A child prodigy, H.E.R. had been singing and performing since girlhood. Little Gabi Wilson sang in her dad’s cover band as a child, and at age 10, she covered Alicia Keys’s “If I Ain’t Got You” on the Today show. When she was 12, she got her big break: She was one of five finalists in an American Idol-like radio show contest, hosted by Radio Disney (she lost). The real break, however, came when she signed her first record deal with Sony at 14.
But she exploded onto the scene in 2018 when she was nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammys.
Late 2018, H.E.R. woke up to news of two Grammy noms: one for Album of the Year (for the self-titled H.E.R. Volume 1) and another for Best New Artist. Couple her top-category nominations with her cryptic seemingly overnight fame (it wasn't), and you have quite the social media maelstrom taking over internet feeds.
H.E.R.'s last album was released in 2019.
We love her for “Focus,” “I Used to Know Her,” and “Hard Place,” but her upcoming album may sound a little bit different. “You never necessarily know what sound you’re going to get,” she told Rolling Stone. With this album, though, we can expect a “more musical” EP following in the footnotes of her predecessors. “People like Quincy Jones and even Rodney Jerkins perfected their mixes and made sure each instrument was doing the right thing. They were looking for that feeling, as opposed to looking for that hit,” she added.
She can play five instruments.
Lizzo may be a goddess with a flute and Alicia Keys a maestro of the ivories, but H.E.R. can get down with one, two, three, four, five musical instruments. A pianist, drummer, and masterful guitarist who can solo with the electric, acoustic, and bass guitar, the woman can rock out. It’s not a competition, of course, but if we’re keeping score, H.E.R.’s translucent Stratocaster is tops.
“Playing guitar is part of who I am, since I was a kid. I remember watching a video of Lenny Kravitz and Prince [from the Rave Un2 the Year 2000 concert] when I was a kid. That video changed my life—it made me want to play guitar just because of how rock star it is,” she said to Rolling Stone.
Prince, Lauryn Hill, and B.B. King are among her inspirations.
“When H.E.R. was a child, she’d wake up in the morning to her dad making breakfast in the kitchen and blasting the late musician’s concert DVD on the television,” WWD wrote about H.E.R.’s affinity for Prince. And fans celebrate the similarities between H.E.R.’s “Lost Souls” (off I Used to Know H.E.R.) and Lauryn Hill’s “Lost Ones.”
Further, Rolling Stone got the artist talking about her blues roots. “B.B. King, with literally one note on the guitar, does something to everyone in the room—and that’s what I’ve been inspired by as far as playing: feeling instead of technique,” she said.
She knows the secret to life. And she learned it from Alicia Keys.
Alicia Keys, who hosted the 2020 Grammys, gave the budding R&B icon a few words of wisdom. “Alicia Keys told me that when it comes to music, all you need is three chords and the truth,” H.E.R. said to Refinery29. “I think you can apply that to life, too.”
DeAnna Janes is a freelance writer and editor for a number of sites, including Harper’s BAZAAR, Tasting Table, Fast Company and Brit + Co, and is a passionate supporter of animal causes, copy savant, movie dork and reckless connoisseur of all holidays. A native Texan living in NYC since 2005, Janes has a degree in journalism from Texas A&M and got her start in media at US Weekly before moving on to O Magazine, and eventually becoming the entertainment editor of the once-loved, now-shuttered DailyCandy. She’s based on the Upper West Side.
![ina garten and jeffrey](https://hips.hearstapps.com/hmg-prod/images/jeffrey-garten-and-ina-garten-attend-the-barefoot-under-the-news-photo-1713807458.jpg?crop=1.00xw:0.668xh;0,0&resize=360:* "2011 "Barefoot Under The Stars" Benefit")
