Billy Porter | Children

Billy Porter is a 1991 graduate of Carnegie Mellon University’s drama program whose Twitter bio covers plenty of ground: Grammy, Emmy, Tony & Drama Desk winning actor, director, singer, dancer, writer, advocate. From IMDB‘s bio: “Billy Porter built a substantial reputation as a theatrical singer in Broadway productions such as Grease and Smokey Joe’s Cafe. He made his initial impact by placing ‘Love Is On The Way’ on the soundtrack to the film First Wives’ Club in 1996 …” He later won a Tony award in 2013 for his portrayal of Lola in Kinky Boots. His breakout TV role was Pray Tell in Pose, which debuted in 2018 and ran for three seasons. In 2021, he returned to his native Pittsburgh to shoot his feature film directorial debut, What If?

NME reports that Porter’s 2021 single “Children” was “co-written with Grammy-winning songwriter MNEK (Dua Lipa, H.E.R.) and Little Mix member Jade Thirwell. Porter said in a press release that ‘Children’ was ‘inspired by [his] life and everything [he’s] gone through to get here,’ saying that he’d always had an ambition to release music like it, but was dissuaded by the state of the industry and its lack of understanding towards what he wanted to express. ‘Music is my first love. I grew up singing in the church. When I first put out commercial music in 1997, the industry was not ready for all this black boy joy! But luckily the world has caught up.'” The tune starts in C minor and shifts to Db minor at 2:49.

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