Born in Columbia, South Carolina, Stone grew up in a musical household. She helped form The Sequence, the first all-female group on the pioneering hip-hop label Sugar Hill Records, making history as one of the first female rap groups. The group’s song Funk You Up has been widely sampled, including by Dr. Dre.
After finding success in the early 1980s, she later joined the trio Vertical Hold before launching her solo career.
Music was always a part of her life. In a 1999 interview with the Associated Press, Stone spoke about her musical influences.
“I’m an only child, so my dad and my mom are my life, and when I was a kid, I’d look up to my dad,” she said. “He was very influential in what I wanted to do.”
Years later, after being hospitalized for congestive heart failure, she made major lifestyle changes, losing over 40 pounds and improving her diet.
At the time, she said she was grateful to be alive and making music. “I feel complete. I have a new love, a new album, a new outlook, and a newfound joy. A few years ago, I was unhappy, depressed, not happy with the label’s efforts to market me. I had to still manage to uplift my audience,” she told the AP in 2007. “Now I feel like I’m on my way to a happily ever after. I’ve been in the business since 1979. I’ve grudged and drudged. Now I can finally say I feel I’ve arrived and mean it.”
Stone won a Soul Train Lady of Soul Award and also pursued acting. She appeared in films like The Hot Chick with Rob Schneider, The Fighting Temptations with Cuba Gooding Jr. and Beyoncé, and Ride Along starring Ice Cube and Kevin Hart. She also performed on Broadway as Big Mama Morton in Chicago.
Additionally, she participated in reality TV, appearing on Celebrity Fit Club and R&B Divas: Atlanta.
