hey i'm stacey orrico just excited to let you step into my world for a second there are things
that that i am dealing with as a 17 year old girl that every 17 year old girl all around the
world is dealing with so i can make music that can relate to them as well regardless of our
our language she was born and raised to know and believe in the lord and his word
and as a proud christian she made sure her artistry also reflected that however she found
greater success going mainstream which caused many fans to question her faith and what direction she
was taking not only her career in but her life as well let's find out what happened to christian pop
singer stacey arico stacy joyo rico was born into an italian-american family in seattle washington
her family which included four other siblings later moved to denver colorado among other
places for a limited time since her parents were missionaries and loved to travel they've done work
in the ukraine mexico and spent many summers in europe courtesy of her father's business dealings
she grew up influenced by a wide range of musical styles and artists such as ella fitzgerald sarah
vaughan whitney houston and lauren hill she was also a member in the church choir she would even
play the piano as everyone saying stacey landed her first record deal at the tender age of 12
in 1998 after she participated in and won a talent competition at a christian music festival
an executive from forefront records one of the biggest labels in the contemporary christian
entertainment business was in attendance and made her an offer on the spot this was all
really just a fluke since she didn't grow up with dreams to be a child pop star at all her
parents fully supported her career so they packed up and moved to nashville tennessee to further it
just two years later her debut album titled genuine hit the streets the album would go on to
break records when it achieved the highest debut week sales ever for a female christian artist
it also produced the hit single don't look at me which topped christian charts for 10 consecutive
weeks it produced several other hits and piqued a lot of people's interest in her
one of those people in particular or three really was r b group destiny's child
and led to an opening act spot for stacy on their survivor tour the following year she would release
her first christmas album an ep titled christmas wish two years after that her career would really
blow up after signing a deal with virgin records and releasing her more mainstream sophomore album
it would also go gold like her debut and the first single called stuck would be her first
song to land on the billboard hot 100 and have even more success worldwide the second single
would do even better there's gotta be more to life peaked at the number 30 position on the hot 100
the album would go on to be nominated for a grammy award for best pop contemporary gospel album
the teenager was now getting a lot of attention outside the christian community she performed
in the macy's thanksgiving day parade and participated at the annual tree lighting ceremony
at rockefeller plaza in manhattan new york mtv and rolling stone magazine even took notice which
posed concerns for listeners wondering if she still considered herself to be a christian artist
in an interview with her record label forefront in the summer of 2003 she explained her take on it
i grew up listening to christian music and mainstream music and i remember always thinking
why do we put artists in all these different categories i would love it if we could take off
all the titles i wish i could be just an artist and yes i am a christian i have not deserted that
that same year she would make her acting debut in the television drama series american dreams
even though stacy was happy with all the success she was experiencing
something else was happening that she knew she needed to address right away several years would
pass before she released another album and the break was very much needed and deliberate
she spoke about it to pop entertainment.com in november 2006 saying for me growing up in the
music industry from the age of 12 and spending some of the most vital developmental years of my
life in the music industry i began to just find my whole identity and the entire foundation of
my life and my relationships and what i perceived to be normal it was all rooted in entertainment
i knew that i needed to go and discover who i was and find my identity outside of staciorico
the artist she even moved back to seattle to live with her parents and got a regular minimum wage
paying day job it was where she felt the most comfortable she's a self-proclaimed homebody
and wasn't interested in partying with diddy and paris hilton in the clubs of new york she'd rather
be cooking at home spending time with family and singing songs around the fireplace by the time
she made it back to the studio again it would be without the support of her label forefront records
who abruptly dropped her she continued on and eventually completed her third album
titled beautiful awakening she considered the album her most personal and best work at the time
the mostly secular effort is full of relationship focus work since at the time of recording stacy
was experiencing falling in and out of love unfortunately getting it out to the masses would
be a complicated and frustrating endeavor first it was set to be released worldwide in august 2006
but for unknown reasons the us release would be postponed then almost all of the songs got leaked
to the internet her label decided to release it anyway to japan the uk and several other countries
the first single called i'm not missing you got such little promotion the first time around it
was re-released several months later finally the us and canada release was canceled altogether
after being postponed several times but not before a temporary digital offering in the states
quickly disappearing from the world wide web shortly thereafter stacy announced that virgin was
merging with capital records and she had left the label the record company terminated her contract
and cancelled her tour dates she did release a surprise jazz track called catch me if you can
in the spring of 2012 but other than that she wouldn't be heard from for nearly seven years
towards the end of 2013 stacy would finally resurface and take to youtube to explain what
she was up to during her long hiatus i moved to africa and i moved back to new york and
was working in studios with all kinds of writers and producers from all genres of music that was
you know inspiring my own creative artistic development and then i moved back to denver to
kind of get in touch with my original creative roots there and then came back to new york and
actually ended up going back to school um studying women's literature and acting i can with so much
excitement tell you that i am back in the studio making a new record i am also pursuing my acting
career at the same time to celebrate her comeback she performed a virtual concert on november 6 via
stageit.com the following summer her independent ep titled reawakened was digitally released
after several years of dating stacy married actor isaiah johnson in july 2016.
today they share two children a son and a daughter on may 25th 2020 stacy along with her two other
colleagues launched the nile project a virtual community designed to connect you to your body
and your essential creative self in july 2020 stacy and r b pop singer tori kelly joined
forces and treated their fans who always thought their voices would complement each other well
on instagram with a special quarantine performance of stacy's hit there's gotta be more to life
in the same 2006 interview with popentertainment.com stacy touched on
how she wanted people to look at her body of work many years in the future i feel like as musicians
and artists because there's been that celebrity craze we're kind of swept into that same category
in order to do well yeah you have to have a good song and good production a pretty good live show
but also you have to have a famous boyfriend and a clothing line and a reality tv show
i'm just not interested in any of that i've never dated anybody in the music industry i don't go
out and party i don't want to have a clothing line all those things just don't interest me
i would love for people to look back and say stacey arico was able to be a true artist
and she always kept it just about the music i hope that people will remember me just for that
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