Tonight's National Anthem at Game 4 of NBA Finals between the Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers at TD Banknorth Garden in Boston will be performed by Anita Baker.The performance will be televised live on ABC in the U.S. and to a worldwide audience in 215 countries and territories beginning at 9:00 p.m. ET.
Anita Baker is currently in the studio recording her forthcoming album due out in the Fall. Baker will be producing the album with Nathan East, Daniel Moore, George Duke and others. The album will include collaboration with Snoop Dogg on a "big, lush" version of Curtis Mayfield's Give You My Love that she promises "is going to raise eyebrows." The rest of the album will be original material.
Anita Baker was born in Detroit, Michigan and started singing in church and later in groups throughout Detroit, before landing a gig with Chapter 8, with whom she had the hit I Just Wanna Be Your Girl in the early 80s. Anita later went solo and recorded the classic collection The Songstress (Angel, and No More Tears) before finding her way to Elektra Entertainment and a decade-long collaboration that birthed such completely perfected projects as Rapture, Giving You The Best That I Got, Compositions, and The Rhythm Of Love, and honing a powerhouse songbook that includes such masterpieces as Watch Your Step, Been So Long, Lead Me Into Love, Talk To Me, Body and Soul and I Apologize. Baker has won Grammy, Soul Train, NAACP Image, Billboard, and Rolling Stone Awards, and she has been heralded as one of the great stylists of our time.
In March 2004, Baker signed an exclusive recording contract with Blue Note Records and in September 2004, a decade after her last studio album, Baker released a new album, My Everything. The album was a success and debuted at No.4 on the Billboard 200 and No.1 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums.
