Yolanda Adams On the Advice Naomi Campbell Told Her Daughter on Performing

Gospel singer Yolanda Adams opened up about some important advice that Naomi Campbell told her daughter, Taylor, who loves acting and modeling.

“One of the most amazing things that happened in our lives [is] when we were at Black Girls Rock,” Adams, 63, exclusively told Us Weekly while promoting her new album Sunny Days. “They were honoring Naomi Campbell, and I had told [Taylor], I had already talked to Naomi, and she’s like, ‘Nah, let her finish school. And you know, she looks so young, anyway, she could go to Paris or Milan or wherever she wants to later.’”

Adams, who shares Taylor with ex-husband Timothy Crawford Jr., went on to share that she introduced Taylor to Campbell, 54, who had some thoughts for her entering the entertainment industry.

“‘Taylor, I want you to listen to your mother, because your mother knows exactly what she’s talking about,’” Adams recalled to Us. “‘I would never let any of my children go into performance or anything like that before they turn 18.’ I’m like, hearing it from mom is one thing, but hearing it from one of the biggest supermodels in the whole wide world, that’s another thing. And so the timing was perfect.”

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Adams noted that she never gave Taylor a “pep talk about the industry” because she was always on tour with her.

“The one thing I did tell her, because she started acting when she was in elementary school, probably like second grade,” she explained. “I saw how she prepared for the roles that she had, and the older she got, because she went to a private school that had great science and math programs, but all they also had a great theatrical program. And so each year, her level of participation got larger and larger and her roles got bigger and bigger. And I asked her, I said, ‘So do you think you want to act when you get older?’ She’s like, ‘Yeah, I think I have the bug.’”

Taylor ended up going to Howard University to study acting and is now in California “living her dreams.”

While Taylor has now gone off into the real world to pursue acting, Adams has been reflecting on what motherhood taught her about herself.

“Motherhood has taught me unconditional love, definitely. It’s also taught me that, although I have the capacity to give her everything that she could ever desire in her little heart, especially growing up, that may not be the best thing,” she shared. “There has to be some restraint. … I think for me, it taught me a lot about my capacity to teach on a more dynamic level.”

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On top of helping Taylor jumpstart her career, Adams is also busy with her own music career, releasing her new album Sunny Days, her first in 13 years.

“Well we started the album in 2018 and, of course, you know the whole world went through a whole bunch of stuff,” she told Us. “And then by the time we opened the world back up Kingdom Business seasons one and two were a part of my life. And I couldn’t really record. I’m like, ‘OK, I gotta get to you guys. … Y’all got to come to Houston because we need to get this album done.’”

Adams shares she’s “excited” to finally have finished the album after a long “journey.”

“Just like life, things happen, but we recovered. And boy, did we recover with Sunny Days,” she gushed.

With reporting by Amanda Williams