Minnie Julia Riperton was born in Chicago on November 9 1949 to Thelma and Daniel Riperton, a Pullman porter. The youngest of eight children in a musical family, Riperton embraced the arts early on. Although she began with ballet and modern dance, Riperton's parents recognized her vocal and musical abilities and encouraged her to pursue music and voice.
At Chicago's Lincoln Center, Riperton received operatic vocal training from Marion Jeffery. She practiced breathing and phrasing, with particular emphasis on diction. Jeffery also trained Riperton to use her full range.
Riperton's first professional singing engagement was with The Gems, when she was fifteen. Raynard Miner, a blind pianist, heard Riperton singing during her stint with Hyde Park's A Cappella Choir and became her musical patron. The Gems had relatively limited commercial success, but proved to be a good outlet for Riperton's talent. Eventually the group became a session group known as Studio Three and it was during this period that they provided the backing vocals on the classic 1965 Fontella Bass hit "Rescue Me".
In 1964, The Gems released a local hit, I Can't Help Myself, and their last single, He Makes Me Feel So Good, was released in 1965. After that, the group released records under numerous names—most notably 1966's Baby I Want You by the Girls Three and 1967's My Baby's Real by the Starlets. The latter has achieved cult status with northern soul fans and remains a favorite. It also was a Motown-style song reminiscent of Tammi Terrell. In 1968, Watered Down was released as a follow-up, under the name The Starlets. It was the last release of Riperton's former girl group.
While a part of Studio Three, Riperton met her mentor, producer Billy Davis. He would write her first local hit, "Lonely Girl", and also "You Gave Me Soul". In honor of Davis, she used the pseudonym Andrea Davis for the release of those two singles.
Some months after her Andrea Davis singles hit the radio, Riperton became session artist at Chess Records signing background for Etta James, Chuck Berry, Muddy Waters and other Chess Records acts. She joined Rotary Connection, a funky rock-soul group creation of Marshall Chess, the son of Chess Records' founder Leonard Chess.
Rotary Connection consisted of Riperton, Chess, Judy Hauff, Sidney Barnes and Charles Stepney. The group released their debut in 1967 and, eventually, five more albums: 1968's Aladdin; the Christmas album Peace; Songs; and finally 1970's Dinner Music and Hey Love.
Riperton's first solo album, Come to My Garden, produced, arranged, and orchestrated by Charles Stepney, was released in 1970 by GRT Records. She was presented as a solo artist by Ramsey Lewis on Saturday, December 26, 1970 at Chicago's famed London House. She performed several numbers from the album accompanied by Charles Stepney, the album's producer. Although commercially unsuccessful, Come to My Garden is now considered a masterpiece by music critics and many others in the music industry.
She was married to songwriter and music producer Richard Rudolph In 1972
In 1973, a college intern for Epic Records found Riperton in semiretirement. She had become a housewife and a mother of two in Gainesville, Florida. After he heard a demo of the song "Seeing You This Way," the rep took the tape to Don Ellis, VP of A&R for Epic.
Riperton signed with Epic Records, and the family moved to Los Angeles, California. The subsequent record, Perfect Angel, turned out to be one of Riperton's best-selling albums. Included were the rock-soul anthem "Reasons", the second single, "Take a Little Trip" (written by Stevie Wonder, who also coproduced the album), and the third single, "Seeing You This Way".
Minnie also sang backup on Wonder's songs "Creepin'" from 1974's "Fullfillingness' First Finale"
Sales of the album Perfect Angel started out slow. Epic was ready to move on to the next record, but Rudolph convinced them to release another single. With the fourth single, "Lovin' You", the album caught on, and in April 1975, the song went to the top of the charts in the U.S. and 24 other countries. The song reached number two in the UK, and number three on the U.S. R&B charts. It sold more than one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc by the RIAA in April 1975. Perfect Angel went gold, and Riperton was finally revered as the "lady with the high voice and flowers in her hair." The album also featured the song "Every Time He Comes Around," with Deniece Williams singing the background vocals.
After Perfect Angel, Riperton and Richard Rudolph started on Riperton's third album, Adventures in Paradise (1975). Joe Sample of The Crusaders cowrote the title song, "Adventures in Paradise", and Crusaders' producer Stewart Levine, coproduced the album. While shooting a promotional clip for the album, she was attacked by a lion, but was not seriously injured.
During an appearance on The Sammy Davis, Jr. Show, she played the footage of the incident for Sammy and her fellow guests, including Richard Pryor. The album was a modest success. Despite the R&B hit "Inside My Love" (a number five U.S. R&B hit), the album did not match the success of Perfect Angel. Some radio stations refused to play "Inside My Love" due to the lyrics: "Will you come inside me?"
Her fourth album for Epic Records entitled Stay in Love featured another collaboration with Stevie Wonder in the funky disco tune "Stick Together”.
Minnie lend her voice again as backup on "Ordinary Pain" from 1976's Songs in the Key of Life .
On August 24, 1976, Riperton told Flip Wilson, who was guest-hosting for Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show, that she had undergone a mastectomy due to breast cancer. At the time of her diagnosis, Riperton found out her cancer had already spread to the lymphatic system, and was given about six months to live.
She continued touring in 1977 and 1978, and became the national spokeswoman for the American Cancer Society 1978–79 campaign.
In 1978, Riperton's attorney Mike Rosenfeld and her husband, Richard Rudolph, orchestrated a move to Capitol Records for Riperton and her CBS Records catalogue.
In 1978, Riperton also received the American Cancer Society's Courage Award which was presented to her at the White House by President Jimmy Carter.
In April 1979, Riperton released her fifth and final album, Minnie. During the recording of the album, her cancer progressed to the point that she was in a great deal of pain. "Memory Lane" was a hit from the album, and was arguably Riperton's greatest work. Riperton incorporated the sadness of the ending of a relationship while suddenly shifting to cries of "I don't want to go," "save me," "now I'm slippin' fast," "thought it was over; here I go again," and "travelin' down, faster than the speed of sound." It is thought that "Memory Lane" was her farewell to her family and to the world.
Her last televised performance was on an episode of The Merv Griffin Show (aired July 6, 1979), during which she performed Memory Lane and Lover and Friend. Extreme lymphedema immobilized her right arm in early 1979. In her final singing appearances on television (most notably on the Mike Douglas Show), her right arm would remain in a fixed position during her performances.
By mid-June, she was confined to bed. She entered Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles on July 10. On Thursday, July 12 at 10 am, while lying in her husband's arms, Riperton died while listening to a recording Stevie Wonder had made for her. That Sunday, following a funeral service attended by more than five hundred mourners, Riperton was interred in the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles. Her epitaph is the opening line of her most famous song, "Lovin' you is easy cause you're beautiful".
After Riperton died, several artists contributed vocals to tracks she had recorded before her death, to help compile Richard Rudolph's final tribute to his wife, Love Lives Forever. Included, among others, were Peabo Bryson, Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder.
Riperton's last single, "Give Me Time", was released in 1980. Richard Rudolph wrote the song, "Now That I Have You" for Riperton, but she never got the chance to record it; he gave the song to Teena Marie, who recorded it (and co-produced it with Rudolph) on Marie's second LP, Lady T.
Finally, in 1981, Capitol Records released The Best of Minnie Riperton, a greatest hits collection. The "new" song on the album was a remake of Joni Mitchell's "A Woman of Heart and Mind", which was a holdover from the Minnie sessions. Also included were an alternate mix of "Memory Lane", live versions of "Can You Feel What I'm Saying", "Lover And Friend", "Young, Willing and Able" and two "Moments with Minnie". It also included the hits "Perfect Angel", "Lovin' You", "Inside My Love", "Adventures In Paradise", and two tracks from Love Lives Forever: the singles "Here We Go" and "You Take My Breath Away".
In 2001 Right Stuff records released “Petals: The Minnie Riperton Collection. Also in the same year EMI released Le Fluer: The Minnie Riperton Anthology.
On June 7, 2009, TV One (US TV network's) Unsung series premiered a one-hour documentary on Riperton's career and life. It included interviews with her husband Richard, son Marc, daughter Maya (Maya Rudolph), sister Sandra Riperton, and many others who worked with Riperton.
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