Memorial service held for Grammy-nominated R&B singer Angie Stone

AUSTELL, Ga. (AP) — Musical artists and loved ones on Friday mourned Grammy-nominated R&B singer Angie Stone, who was killed in a car crash earlier this month.

Mourners filed into the massive Word of Faith Cathedral west of Atlanta, taking their seats around a silver and gold casket surrounded by a sea of red roses.

“In her song No More Rain (In This Cloud),'” she says my sunshine is coming, and I’m all cried out,” filmmaker and entertainment executive Tyler Perry said at Friday's service.

“There’s no more rain in this cloud," he said. “The beauty of what she was talking about is when a cloud has no more tears, it dissipates, it’s gone.”

The song, like so many of Stone's hits, found great success. It reached No. 1 for 10 weeks on Billboard’s Adult R&B airplay chart.

The cargo van she was riding in flipped over and was then hit by a truck on March 1 near Montgomery, Alabama, music producer and Stone’s longtime manager Walter Millsap III has said. Everyone else in the van survived except Stone, who was 63. Online tributes from fans and fellow artists poured in after her death.

“God is good even when life is not, and so we celebrate the life of our sister that has been well-lived,” said Bishop Dale Bronner, the church’s senior pastor.

Many acclaimed musical artists performed at the service, including Keke Wyatt, Anthony Hamilton and Kirk Franklin.

Before Wyatt sang Friday, she recalled how Stone would call her in the middle of the night to pray with her or give her encouragement.

“She was so beautiful,” Wyatt said. “Like seriously, I love her music and I love her voice and all that. But her as a person trumps all of that.”

The church-grown singer was born in Columbia, where music was always in her life since she was a child, Stone told The Associated Press in a 1999 interview. Her mother would sing around the house, and her father sang gospel and blues at establishments around Columbia.

Another service is planned on Saturday in Columbia, at First Nazareth Baptist Church.

Stone was a member of the all-female hip-hop trio The Sequence and known for the hit song “Wish I Didn’t Miss You.” She helped form The Sequence, the first all-female group on the hip-hop trailblazing imprint Sugar Hill Records, becoming one of the first female groups to record a rap song.

The group recorded “Funk You Up,” which has been sampled by numerous artists, including Dr. Dre.

After finding success in the early 1980s, Stone later joined the trio Vertical Hold before launching her solo career.

Stone created hits like “Baby” with legendary soul singer Betty Wright, another No. 1 hit; and “Wish I Didn’t Miss You” and “Brotha.”

She found a sweet spot in the early 2000s as neo-soul begin to dominate the R&B landscape with the emergence of singers like Erykah Badu, Jill Scott, Maxwell and D’Angelo.

Her 2001 album “Mahogany Soul” reached No. 22 on the Billboard 200, while 2007’s “The Art Of Love & War” peaked at No. 11.

A Soul Train Lady of Soul winner, Stone went on to showcase her acting chops with film roles in “The Hot Chick” starring Rob Schneider, “The Fighting Temptations,” which starred Cuba Gooding Jr. and Beyoncé, and “Ride Along” led by Ice Cube and Kevin Hart.

She also hit the Broadway stage as Big Mama Morton in “Chicago,” and she showcased her vulnerability on the reality TV shows “Celebrity Fit Club” and “R&B Divas: Atlanta.”

But her qualities as a person and her lasting imprint on people around her were qualities that kept coming up from speaker after speaker at Friday's service.

“This woman sewed good things to people, she sewed kindness to people, she sewed joy to people, she sewed love and her voice to people,” Perry said.

Programs are passed out before the memorial of singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Diamond, daughter of Angie Stone, is supported through tears at her mother's memorial service, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Diamond, daughter of Angie Stone, receives a plaque in honor of her mother at a memorial service, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Fans and friends gather to celebrate the life of singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Fans and friends gather to celebrate the life of singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Fans and friends gather to celebrate the life of singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

STOUT performs at the memorial service for singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

The family of singer and actress Angie Stone speak at her memorial service, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Fans and friends gather to celebrate the life of singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Fans and friends gather to celebrate the life of singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Keke Wyatt performs at the memorial service for singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Fans and friends gather to celebrate the life of singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Fans and friends gather to celebrate the life of singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

An attendee flips through the program at the memorial service for singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Tyler Perry stands and applauds at the memorial service for singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Renowned Gospel Music singer, Kirk Franklin, performs at the memorial service for singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Fans and friends gather to celebrate the life of singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Tyler Perry speaks at the memorial service for singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

Fans and friends gather to celebrate the life of singer and actress Angie Stone, Friday, March 14, 2025, in Austell. Ga. (AP Photo/Olivia Bowdoin)

FILE - Alicia Keys, right, and Angie Stone, perform "America the Beautiful" during the NBA All-Star game in Philadelphia, Feb. 10, 2002. (AP Photo/Dan Loh, file)

FILE - Soul singer Angie Stone, pictured in New York, Oct. 14, 1999. (AP Photo/Jim Cooper, file)

FILE - Angie Stone poses as she walks down the red carpet during the 2009 Soul Train Awards taping at the Georgia World Congress Center, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2009 in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Gregory Smith, File)

A Ukrainian drone strike killed one person and wounded three others in the Russian city of Voronezh, local officials said Sunday.

A young woman died overnight in a hospital intensive care unit after debris from a drone fell on a house during the attack on Saturday, regional Gov. Alexander Gusev said on Telegram.

Three other people were wounded and more than 10 apartment buildings, private houses and a high school were damaged, he said, adding that air defenses shot down 17 drones over Voronezh. The city is home to just over 1 million people and lies some 250 kilometers (155 miles) from the Ukrainian border.

The attack came the day after Russia bombarded Ukraine with hundreds of drones and dozens of missiles overnight into Friday, killing at least four people in the capital Kyiv, according to Ukrainian officials.

For only the second time in the nearly four-year war, Russia used a powerful new hypersonic missile that struck western Ukraine in a clear warning to Kyiv and NATO.

The intense barrage and the launch of the nuclear-capable Oreshnik missile followed reports of major progress in talks between Ukraine and its allies on how to defend the country from further aggression by Moscow if a U.S.-led peace deal is struck.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Saturday in his nightly address that Ukrainian negotiators “continue to communicate with the American side.”

Chief negotiator Rustem Umerov was in contact with U.S. partners Saturday, he said.

Separately, Ukraine’s General Staff said Russia targeted Ukraine with 154 drones overnight into Sunday and 125 were shot down.

Follow the AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

This photo provided by the Ukrainian Security Service on Friday, Jan. 9, 2026, shows a fragment believed to be a part of a Russian Oreshnik intermediate range hypersonic ballistic missile that hit the Lviv region. (Ukrainian Security Service via AP)

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy, second left, listens to British Defense Secretary John Healey during their meeting in Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Danylo Antoniuk)