Stephanie Mills has one of the most powerful voices in soul music history and she also probably has one of the most short lived marriages to a fellow R&B singer in soul music history as well.
In 1980, the “Power of Love” singer jumped the broom with a popular R&B singer of the late 70s and 80s era. At that time, some of their family and friends hated the fact that they said “I do” to each other, but Stephanie and her man were determined to make their love and their marriage work. If you’re a fan of old school R&B music, you know her ex-husband very well, even if you may not have known that they were once in wedded bliss at the height of their careers.
A SHALAMAR SINGER IS MILLS’ EX-HUSBAND!
Now I know what some of you may be thinking: ‘Wasn’t Jeffrey in a long term relationship with his fellow Shalamar member, Jody Watley, during that time? The answer is ‘yes,’ BUT the answer is also ‘no.’
While it is true that Jeffrey and Jody were seriously dating in the late 70s, things went sour between them. So they broke up and both of them moved on with their love-lives, but Shalamar stayed together. That’s when Jeffrey met Stephanie.
Stephanie Mills Reveals Why Marriage To Jeffrey Daniels Fell Apart
Jeffrey and Stephanie married only a few short months after they were introduced by a mutual friend and remember we mentioned that some of their family and friends hated that they were married? Mills revealed why in a past interview with Ebony Magazine. See the excerpts below:
Stephanie Mills:”My marriage was plagued by controversies and pressures from the moment Jeffrey and I decided to become husband and wife. Let’s just say there have been some forces -some people actually- determined from the very beginning to keep us apart, and when we went ahead and married, they did everything possible to break us up.”
SM: “Its’s no secret that my family didn’t want me to get married. My parents knew that I had made up my mind to do it, so I had their blessing, and my mother was helping plan the wedding. But others in my family thought it would be better for me to remain home. They’ve always wanted to keep me close by and protect me. But I was a full grown woman when I decided to marry, and I knew it was time for me to start making my own decisions about my life.”
EbonyMag: So what did you do?
SM: “I packed up my things, left my family [she had bought a 27 room house in New York’s suburban Westchester County for them], and moved in with my sister Judy in Los Angeles until I married and found my own place.
Stephanie and Jeffrey were married for over a year, before Stephanie filed for divorce in September of 1981. Word on the Old School curb has always been that one of Stephanie’s sisters seriously wanted her to hold out for her ex-boyfriend, Michael Jackson (yes THE MJ…they were a couple back in the day), and eventually marry him one day.
There were also rumors that on Stephanie Mills’ and Jeffrey Daniel’s wedding day, one of her sisters attempted to pull Stephanie out of the car, just before she and Jeffrey were about to be whisked away into marital bliss. But that was never confirmed, although Stephanie did admit to terminating her working relationship with her sister, Audrey, around the same time.
In that same Ebony interview, Stephanie also said that Jeffrey’s friends didn’t like her, although she didn’t know why.
Like we always say, here at I LOVE OLD SCHOOL MUSIC, many of our favorite celebs go through regular trials and tribulations just like the rest of us, because they’re human. Much respect to Ms. Mills for sharing her’s with the public.
