Stevie Wonder Biography

Born in Saginaw, Michigan in 1950, little Stevie Wonder enjoyed his first hit, “Fingertips (Pt. 2)” when he was only thirteen years old. By 1970, Stevie Wonder had success with a few other singles, including “For Once in My Life,” My Cherie Amour,” and “Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I’m Yours.”

Then Stevie Wonder’s Music of My Mind was released in 1972, and later that year he released Talking Book, which featured the single “Superstition,” a song which would go on to become a smash hit. Innervisions came next, featuring “Living for the City” and “Higher Ground,” and garnered Stevie Wonder several Grammies. More hits followed, including Fulfillingness First Finale (1974), Songs in the Key of Life (1976), and Hotter than July (1980), each of which won Stevie Wonder additional Grammies and rocketed him to superstar status.

In the new millennium, Stevie Wonder has contributed music to a variety of milestone events in history. He performed “They Won’t Go When I Go” and “Never Dreamed You’d Leave in Summer” for Michael Jackson’s memorial service in 2009. In 2010, Stevie Wonder performed for Hope for Haiti Now: A Global Benefit for Earthquake Relief, singing “Bridge over Troubled Water.” In 2011, he performed in Athens, Greece, at the opening ceremony for the Special Olympics World Summer Games, and in 2012, Stevie Wonder and Christina Aguilera sang “Shelter in the Rain” and the Lord’s Prayer at the funeral for Eta James.

Stevie Wonder has become an iconic figure in music history, with album sales topping 72 million. He’s recorded almost forty albums and delivered more than thirty Top Ten hits. In addition to his Lifetime Achievement Award and Academy Award for Best Song (for “I Just Called to Say I Love You” from The Woman In Red), Stevie Wonder has earned more than twenty-five Grammies. More than thirty of his singles have found a home on the Top Ten charts, and in 2004, Rolling Stone named Stevie Wonder one of their 100 Greatest Rock and Roll Artists of All Time.

Stevie Wonder has been inducted into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Rock and roll Hall of Fame. In 2013, he was listed as one of Billboard Magazines top All-Time Artists, and in the year following, he was the recipient of a Presidential Medial of Freedom, awarded by then president Barack Obama.