A group of young singer-songwriters have transformed the genre by looking backward, without getting stuck in the past. Here and below are seven of the many contemporary artists who are redefining and ...

Since the turn of the 21st century, critics have prophesied that R&B, a once-dominating music genre, is dead. Male artists aren’t professing their love in pouring rain, draped in silk shirts anymore.

Long live the king. This week, Jacquees anointed himself the undisputed ruler of R&B— and all hell broke loose. “I just wanna let everybody know that I’m the king of R&B right now, for this generation ...

Welcome to The State of R&B, ESSENCE’s look at the past, present and future of rhythm and blues. In this piece, writer Jaelani Turner-Williams addresses claims that today’s R&B is too sexual. R&B’s ...

Editor's note: This post was originally published in October 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness. The landmark album helped announce the singer-songwriter from Brooklyn and further ...

As a concept, alternative R&B is older than its reputation. It emerged in the late ‘90s as a subset of a style the writer Gail Mitchell referred to as “real R&B” in a Billboard story from 2000 — music ...

Billboard chooses its top R&B albums of the year, featuring sets from SZA, Summer Walker, GIVEON and many more. There’s one thing you can say about 2025 musically: it was a very good year for R&B.

Hip-hop’s takeover of R&B over the past decade altered its sound as soul artists aggressively pulled away from the genre’s conventional boundaries and embraced rap. Given the boys’ club culture of rap ...

The R&B world has been rocked by tragedy in 2025, and another legendary singer has now joined the list of those lost. From icons to stars gone far too young, it has been a heartbreaking year. The ...