Jay-Z

I dedicate this post to TFR reader Albert who recently confessed to reading my blog despite it being "gay." If Jay-Z can find meaning in Annie, I think anything is possible.

The rapper Jay-Z on convincing composer Charles Strouse to let him sample Annie for “Hard Knock Life”:

“I told him that we had an essay [contest] at school and I won the essay and we went to see Annie on Broadway and how it affected my life. The truth is — that last part was true, it did affect my life. My sister Andrea, we call her Annie, so when it came on TV I was immediately drawn to it. I was like, this is about us. This is how we feel. So years later, when I was on tour and Kid Capri had played this instrumental that the 45 King had made, it stopped me in my tracks. I was walking offstage after performing, and he played the song as an intermission before the next act went on, and I heard this sound, with these drums, and I told everybody around me, 'Wait a minute.' I went around to the D.J. booth, like, what is that? [45 King] is notoriously hard to find. We found him in Maryland somewhere. I recorded the record.”