Lizzo

Lizzo in 2019, DFree/bigstock.com

Birth Name: Melissa Viviane Jefferson

Place of Birth: Detroit, Michigan, U.S.

Date of Birth: April 27, 1988

Ethnicity: African-American, as well as English

Lizzo is an American singer, rapper, songwriter, actress, and flutist. Her songs include “Good as Hell,” “Truth Hurts,” “Juice,” “Rumors,” and “About Damn Time;” and, as a featured artist, “Blame It on Your Love;” as well as the promotional single “Grrrls.” Her acting roles include the films UglyDolls, Hustlers, and Renaissance: A Film by Beyoncé; and the show Brad Neely’s Harg Nallin’ Sclopio Peepio. She has also hosted the shows Wonderland and Lizzo’s Watch Out for the Big Grrrls, and been featured in the documentary Love, Lizzo. She was a member of jazz/prog rock quintet Ellypseas, electro soul-pop duo Lizzo & the Larva Ink, female rap/R&B group The Chalice, and hip-hop group Grrrl Prty.

Her father’s name was Michael. She was raised in Detroit, then Houston, Texas, and later moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Lizzo’s paternal grandfather was John Andrew Franklin (the son of Calvin Columbus Franklin and Hattie Caldonia Cunningham). John was born in Aberdeen, Monroe, Mississippi. Calvin was born in Muldoon, Monroe, the son of John Thomas Franklin, Sr. and Emma A. Neal. Calvin was a white man. Hattie was black. The two conceived at least one other child together, both while Calvin was married to another woman nearby. Calvin was a descendant of slaveowners.

Some of Lizzo’s ancestors, her great-great-great-grandmother Susan, and Susan’s parents Ambrose and Susan Dangerfield, were owned by Nathaniel H. Hooe. Nathaniel had stipulated upon his death in 1844, that his hundreds of slaves be freed and sent to Africa, to live in Liberia. Nathaniel’s relatives successfully sued to keep Nathaniel’s Mississippi slaves, including Lizzo’s ancestors, enslaved. Susan was then separated from her parents at eight years old. Manumission of slaves was illegal under Mississippi law at the time.

A DNA test whose results were displayed on the show Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates, Jr. (2026) stated that Lizzo’s genetic ancestry consists of:

*68% African
——–*31% Nigeria
——–*14% Benin & Togo
——–*8% Western Bantu Peoples
——–*4% Cameroon
——–*3% Mali
——–*2% Ivory Coast & Ghana
——–*2% Central Nigeria
——–*1% Senegal
——–*1% Yorubaland
——–*1% Central West Africa
——–*1% Southern Bantu Peoples
*32% European
——–*16% England & Northwest Europe
——–*12% Scotland
——–*3% Germanic Europe
——–*1% Spain