“They called me their little mockingbird.”Ī few years later, after performing in a Black history program, a 14-year-old Ward was offered a recording contract, which was rejected by her parents. “The people were just loving me,” Ward recalled. Ward recalled a story in which she and her grandmother were aboard a train, and Ward, at two years old, gave both her grandmother and the other passengers a glimpse of what would later become her signature light, soprano voice. Early on, Ward watched as various members of her family displayed a knack for vocalizing, a talent that she says was “probably in my blood.” The lyrics to “Ring My Bell” had made their way onto the breath of Anita Ward, a then 21-year-old college graduate who had no idea that her life was about to change forever, and that her bell would be “ringing” for decades to come.īorn in Memphis, Tennessee, it seems that Anita Ward was destined to have a career in show business. In the summer of 1979, one of disco’s most successful and memorable songs was released.

Anita ward ring my bell lyrics