Catching Up With John Legend About Family, the 10th Anniversary of “All of Me” and Reimagining Legend

Before he became a 12-time Grammy winner, R&B superstar John Legend was known as John Stephens, a kid born and raised in a music-loving household in Springfield, Ohio. After graduating from North High School, he enrolled at the University of Pennsylvania and studied English. While there, he’d become a lead vocalist in the college’s acappella group the Counterparts, and, through a chance encounter spurred by a friend from campus, play piano on Lauryn Hill’s “Everything Is Everything.” But the John Legend we know now is one of immense vocal finesse and charismatic technique. He’s a long way away from the southwestern Ohio town he grew up in, though he still spends his fall Saturdays watching the Ohio State Buckeyes play.

There is a simple truth orbiting around Legend always: Few musicians working today are as smooth or captivating as him. Over the last 20 years, through songs like “Heaven,” “Ordinary People” and “All of Me,” he’s become a household name across the world. He’s made tunes with artists like the Roots, Brandy, And?e 3000 and Stevie Wonder and, after running around in Kanye West’s crew at the turn of the millennium and achieving EGOT status in 2018, Legend’s legacy is still a work-in-progress. His eighth record, Legend, released last fall, immediately arrived as his most ambitious project, packed with two-dozen songs, cameos from some of R&B and hip-hop’s brightest and songs that already live in the echelons of a career that’s spanned three different decades.

Now, Legend’s taken his first-ever self-titled record and stripped it down to just him and a piano, a gorgeous offering of songs that have been given another life outside of what they initially were in 2022. Much like in his early days, when he was a 20-something management consultant making music outside of work hours, the new reimagining of Legend is a portrait of an artist hungry to give something brand new to the world. Last week, Legend sat down with Paste to talk about performing at the GRAMMYs with Jay-Z, the everlasting sentimentality of “All of Me” and how that motivated him to flip the script on his eighth record.

Paste: You got to close out the GRAMMYs this year. Playing in front of the industry’s biggest names and faces, is there extra weight that comes with a performance like that?

John Legend: It’s very special and you want to give it your best, and there’s so many people that we look up to who are in the audience. And then, even the people I was performing with, I look up to. You know, Jay-Z and Lil Wayne and Rick Ross, everybody was so talented. I felt very fortunate to be a part of [GOD DID]. And, you know, Jay-Z is, of course, the MVP of that record. His verse was very newsworthy and showed his virtuosity as an MC. To be a part of making that record complete, it was an honor.

Paste: Jay-Z was kind of the star of the show the whole time. I feel like all of the cameras were pointed on him during every performance.

Legend: Everyone was curious about what was gonna happen with Beyoncé. Everyone was curious about how he reacted to the [50th Anniversary of Hip-Hop] celebration. So yeah, he got a lot of camera time.

Paste: I have to ask, what was it like being a 20-year-old college kid playing piano on The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill?

Legend: Oh, it was so cool. It was the biggest thing that ever happened to me at that point. I’d never played on any kind of major album before and, if you go back in time, to where we were in music, the Fugees had gargantuan success with The Score and “Killing Me Softly.” Everyone was excited for what Lauryn Hill’s debut was going to sound like. To have a friend with a close connection to her that would introduce me to her was just very cool and very fortunate on my part. The chance to hang out with them as they were making this historic album, and then the chance to actually play on it, was insane. I went back to school so excited, telling everybody I was on Track 13 on the album. It really helped open doors for me to work with different producers and it became my first tiny claim to fame.

Paste: You two were nominated for a GRAMMY together a few years later, too. Do you still keep in touch?

Legend: I haven’t spoken to her in a while. Whenever I see her, I’m always excited and give her a big hug. We’ve never had each other’s numbers or anything like that, but I still have so much respect for her artistry.

Paste: Your debut Get Lifted wasn’t just your debut; it was the GOOD Music debut, too. Going into that record, did you know it was going to be the first release on the label?

Legend: I knew. GOOD Music was a new entity, and Kanye [West] had just come out with his own debut. That came out in February 2004 and then Get Lifted came out in December. I knew that I was the lead artist coming out of GOOD Music and I was excited. You know, Kanye had just taken the world by storm with The College Dropout and he had a very influential hand in my own album. I had done a lot of work on The College Dropout and I just felt like we, as a collective, were onto something really special. I was very optimistic about, creatively and commercially, what we could accomplish together.

Paste: Yeah, because when he was making The College Dropout, you were doing harmonies and piano work on that record. But I feel like you both were still pretty up-and-coming, because he had been doing a lot of producing and you had been demoing your own work. What’s the energy like in a room shared between a couple of musicians who are hungry to make a name for themselves with their own music?

Legend: I think we both had a lot of self-belief and optimism that we were offering something, creatively, that was fresh and went against the grain of what was happening in most of music at that time. And it wasn’t just the two of us, it was a whole collective. Most of them were guys from Chicago that Kanye had known for years, people like J. Ivy and Malik Yusef, and No I.D. was around sometimes. Consequence, GLC. It was a bunch of us around together just collaborating, believing that we had something fresh to offer the world, musically. It was a special time.

Paste: I’m glad you brought up J. Ivy. What made you initially reluctant to go by “John Legend” after he suggested it?

Legend: Well, I wasn’t looking for a stage name. I thought I’d be just fine being John Stephens. That’s all I’d ever been in my mind, so I wasn’t looking to change my name. But the more he started calling me that, and others in our crew started calling me that, I started to consider what it would mean to change my stage name to be that, rather than just a nickname, to actually make it my official name going out to the world. Kanye was introducing me as John Legend when he would introduce me to other people that we were in the studio with. And then, I think he called me out as John Legend on a mixtape track, or something like that. So, it started to be the case where more and more people were knowing me by that nickname.

I had to make a decision, and I was reluctant, you know? Because, one, you’re calling yourself “Legend” when you never even put a record out, which is audacious. And then, two, I hadn’t planned to change my name. I decided to go ahead and do it, because I felt like it was, in some ways, a leap of faith, saying that, “I’m gonna have to prove myself, giving myself this heavy name that I have to carry. But I’m gonna go into it expecting that I can prove myself and try to live up to the name.”

Paste: It feels crazy to say this, but it’s been almost 10 years since you put out “All of Me,” which became your seminal track.

Legend: [Chrissy Teigen and I] are gonna celebrate our wedding anniversary, ten years, so I’m very aware of the timing now. But yeah, the first time I sang it live was at our wedding and we’ll be 10 years married in September.

Paste: I was just about to say, because you wrote and released that song right around when you and Chrissy got married. But now that you have three kids together, this big family, is the song’s importance to you even more immense now that it once was when you first wrote it?

Legend: I think it’ll really hit me when we celebrate the anniversary. We’re gonna celebrate it in the same place and cherish all these memories that we’ve created together over 10 years. Our family obviously has expanded, and there’s just so much joy and love and connection in the house right now. When it comes to the song, I told my label that I thought it would be my biggest song. At that point, all it had to beat was “Ordinary People” and “Green Light,” and both of those songs peaked in the Top 25 of the Hot 100. They did well, but they weren’t massive hits. I told the label, “I feel like this can be my biggest hit.”

But it took a long time. It came out right around when we got married, but it didn’t hit #1 until the spring of the following year. It took six months of being out before it hit #1. It had a long slog and worked its way up the Adult Contemporary chart, which is an important chart for an R&B artist. But it’s a relatively small audience, when you compare it to pop playlists and Top-40 lists and all of those things, which “All of Me” eventually got to, but it took a long time for me to get over to those stations.

Paste: And then once it did, it blew the gates wide open.

Legend: You know, the GRAMMYs were such a big part of that story. The song wasn’t huge yet. The GRAMMYs air in late January, early February, every year. I performed the song at the GRAMMYs in the middle of the arena. They had a little spotlight on Chrissy when I sang it to her, and that was the moment that made the song the #1 song. It went straight up the iTunes charts, when that meant something, and then it hit #1 [on the Hot 100 chart] not too long after.

Paste: The GRAMMYs aren’t perfect, but at least you got to have that moment, which seems pretty perfect.

Legend: Sometimes, Ken Ehrlich would just take a leap of faith with a song that wasn’t even a big hit, because he really liked it. That’s what he did with [“All of Me”], and it really made a difference. Then it became everybody’s wedding song and became a song that took on a life of its own. I hear so many covers of it. I hear instrumental covers and vocal covers all over the place. Most artists don’t get one song like that in their career, so I’m grateful that [“All of Me”] meant so much to so many people. And it changed my life.

Paste: A self-titled record usually means that the work is some of the most important in an artist’s career, whether it’s a debut or, even in your case, an eighth record. What was the motivation behind naming [Legend] after yourself?

Legend: I think the fact that it was my first double album. Every album’s personal, so I didn’t want to make it like, “Oh, finally, I’m doing a personal album.” But I think, when you have the space and creative output to make a double album, I felt like [Legend] was really representative of all of my influences and who I am and all the things I’m thinking about. All the things I’ve learned over the years. It felt like the right time to self-title it.

Paste: The record has a great batch of collaborators on it, too. JID, Rick Ross, Jazmine Sullivan. You’ve been on both sides. Does the dynamic change, depending on what role you’re performing?

Legend: I think it does change, if you’re a guest on someone else’s project versus them being a guest on yours. When it’s my album, I have a vision for who I want on the record, what I want them to accomplish with their verse, with their contribution to the record. When it’s a vocalist doing a duet with me, I’ll usually sing a rough idea of what I would like them to do on the record. Even though I trust their judgment, I want to give them my thesis or hypothesis on what it should sound like and let them run with it. I’m very much in control when it’s my project. When it’s someone else’s project, I feel like I’m trying to do the same thing I want my guest to do for me, which is be complimentary, be open to their ideas and give them what they’re looking for, for the record.

Paste: I think JID put out one of the best rap records of 2022. What was it like getting him on a track like “Dope”?

Legend: I started listening to some of his earlier work. This is before [The Forever Story] came out. I felt like he had the virtuosity as an MC, the charisma, everything I needed for that track. He had the exact ability to do that, and I liked that idea of having someone that was relatively new as well and up-and-coming, rather than someone I had done a bunch of work with before.

Paste: Is there someone out there who you’ve worked with once or twice that you’d love to get back in the studio with again?

Legend: I’m a big fan of Lil Wayne. Most of the things we’ve done together haven’t been direct collaborations. It’s been more like on [DJ Khaled’s] album, or somebody else’s project, so I would love to work with him again. I feel like he’s so creative and interesting as an artist.

Paste: You were just nominated for a GRAMMY for playing on DJ Khaled’s “God Did.” You’ve worked with him multiple times in the past, even winning a GRAMMY with him. The internet likes to dunk on him a bit, but he is consistently working with the best artists in the world. What are people outside of the industry getting wrong about his musicianship?

Legend: One of the skills he has is he came up as a DJ. I think he understands really good music. He’s a great A&R. He understands what sounds good and what feels good, he works with the right producers and the right artists and people enjoy working with him. He has a great ear and he has a great willingness to bring people together. And I think he’s established a track record with us as artists that, when we do a track with him, it usually comes out really good. So, he’s doing something right to make these records and bring all of us together. He brings some of the most talented people in the world together, and that’s not something everyone can do. I think people underestimate how difficult and how special that is.

Paste: What was the inspiration behind releasing a version of Legend that was just you and your piano, no supporting cast?

Legend: I’d never done it before, but it seemed like a natural thing to do. My label president, Wendy Goldstein, suggested it. And I love the idea, because I do a lot of solo shows. I have an approach when I do a solo show, when it’s just me on the piano, and a lot of my songs I’ve reinterpreted that way for a live show. But I’ve never actually made an album like that, except years before I even got a record deal. I did a solo live recording that I released to my fans. It was just a thing that most people haven’t heard or seen, so I loved the idea of doing it. It grew out of all the live performances that I do on my own, and I’m used to being my own band, sometimes, so it felt like a fun challenge to try and reimagine these songs that have full production.

Paste: Does it change the way that you grow to appreciate certain tracks over time?

Legend: Oh, yeah. Part of it is just deciding, because we had 24 tracks to choose from but only cover 10 songs from the album and then two covers from other artists. So choosing the 10 songs from the album was interesting, because I fooled around on the piano until I felt like, “Oh, this will be fun and this will be beautiful and this will be special, so I’m going to use this one.” And then, other ones, I was like, “Yeah, this isn’t gonna work, let’s leave it alone.” So, I kind of auditioned each song for myself, trying out ideas and seeing if I thought they were worth doing. I only wanted to record them if the solo version would add something to the life of the song. And, hopefully, we were able to choose the right time to do that.

Paste: Has there ever been a transition or an evolution in your approach to making records? Or is it a formula that has stayed true since the early days, when you were making Get Lifted and Once Again?

Legend: I think I’ve honed it and tightened it a little bit over the years, but a lot of my workstyle and writing style has been similar over the last 20 years. Once I figured out how I like to write songs, once I figured out my process that worked best for me, it’s been pretty consistent. I think the only major differences between each album are the choices about who I collaborate with, what producers, what executive producers, etc. That’s changed each album, and sometimes I’ll go in a different direction. But I think my artistry, my technique for writing and recording my vocals, whatever I do as an individual, hasn’t changed very much.

Paste: A big thing that happened a few years ago was you joined a very prestigious group of people who have won an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Award. You’ve accomplished so much, we can’t deny that. Where does achieving EGOT status sit, in terms of everything that’s played out for you so far?

Legend: It’s very special. It’s just a very rare group to be a part of, only 18 of us now in the world. Viola Davis just joined us on Sunday. But everyone in this group, it’s not all of the greatest artists, because Beyoncé is not an EGOT, Jay-Z’s not an EGOT, Kanye’s not an EGOT. You know, there are plenty of amazing artists who aren’t EGOTs, but the ones who are, they’ve done amazing things in their careers and they’ve done it across multiple forms of media, which is pretty impressive. I think most of us are going to be good collaborators because, with me, I couldn’t have done the Emmy or the Tony without having great collaborators and working on a team. I couldn’t have even won my Grammys without being a great collaborator and working with the best producers and co-writers and all of that good stuff. Then, of course, the Oscar came as a collaboration with Common and Ava DuVernary for [Selma].

Paste: Something I’ve always admired about you is that you are an artist who is so vocally family-first. How has the music shifted now that you’re a dad and you’ve been a husband for 10 years? What is your vision of success now?

Legend: My music helps me prioritize how I want to spend my time. It’s changed the setting for how I create, because it encouraged me to get my own studio so I could be close to home when I’m working. It just makes you think about every moment you spend and whether it’s worth working more or carving out that time to spend with your family. So, it’s always a balancing act. [Chrissy and I] go back-and-forth sometimes about “Am I working too much during this period of time?” We just had a baby and I’m also putting out music and a skincare line and all of these other things. But, I’m trying my best to be a really present father and husband. It’s a high priority for me because, I mean, it’s everything. What are we doing all of this for if it’s not to build a family and a legacy together?

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Matt Mitchell is Paste’s assistant music editor, and a poet, essayist, and culture critic from Northeast Ohio. Find him on Twitter @matt_mitchell48.