Floetry Announces 16-City ‘Say Yes’ Tour With Raheem Devaughn

Natalie "The Floacist" Stewart (left) and Marsha Ambrosius are the R&B duo Floetry. The group announced Thursday they will reunite for the 16-city "Say Yes" Tour beginning in April 2026, marking their first extensive national run in a decade. (Courtesy Photo)

Floetry never fit neatly into the R&B machine the first time around.

When Marsha Ambrosius and Natalie “The Floacist” Stewart released “Floetic” in 2002, they brought spoken word to the center of contemporary soul at a moment when the genre leaned toward polish and radio gloss. The album went platinum in the United States, earned Grammy nominations and produced two of the era’s defining records, “Say Yes” and “Getting Late.” Then, four years later, the partnership dissolved.

Nearly two decades after their commercial peak — and almost 10 years since their last full national run — Floetry will return to the road.

The duo announced Thursday that they will reunite for the 2026 “Say Yes” Tour, a 16-city U.S. trek beginning April 9 in Newark, New Jersey, and concluding May 17 in Oakland, California. The run, produced by the Black Promoters Collective, marks their first extensive national tour together since 2016.

The announcement carries significance not because Floetry has been absent from playlists — their catalog has endured — but because the group’s history has been defined as much by fracture as influence.

After the success of “Floetic” and 2005’s “Flo’Ology,” tensions between Ambrosius and Stewart led to a split in 2006. Both artists later spoke publicly about creative and personal disagreements that shaped the breakup. Ambrosius went on to build a solo career that included Grammy nominations and high-profile songwriting credits, while Stewart continued performing and recording under The Floacist moniker, leaning further into spoken word and independent releases.

A brief reunion tour in 2015 and 2016 hinted at reconciliation, but sustained collaboration never followed.

This 2026 run appears more structured. The routing spans major R&B markets including Philadelphia, Chicago, Detroit, Washington, Atlanta and Houston — cities that supported neo-soul beyond its commercial peak. The bill also includes Raheem DeVaughn and Teedra Moses, two artists whose careers followed parallel arcs: critical respect, durable touring bases and limited reliance on mainstream radio cycles.

DeVaughn, a Grammy-nominated vocalist often referred to as “The Love King,” has maintained steady visibility through independent releases and touring. Moses’ 2004 debut “Complex Simplicity” has grown in stature among R&B listeners over time, frequently cited as one of the genre’s cult classics of the 2000s.

The lineup suggests a targeted audience — not casual nostalgia seekers, but listeners who came of age during the early-2000s neo-soul wave and have stayed with it.

Presales began Thursday through the Black Promoters Collective using code BPC, with general ticket sales scheduled for Friday at 10 a.m. local time.

2026 Tour Dates

• April 9: Newark, NJ — NJPAC
• April 11: Baltimore, MD — Lyric
• April 12: Philadelphia, PA — The Met
• April 15: Chicago, IL — Chicago Theatre
• April 18: Detroit, MI — Masonic
• April 22: Washington, DC — The Anthem
• April 24: Charlotte, NC — Ovens Auditorium
• April 26: Durham, NC — DPAC
• May 1: Atlanta, GA — The Arena at Southlake
• May 3: Jacksonville, FL — Florida Theatre
• May 6: New Orleans, LA — Saenger Theatre
• May 9: Houston, TX — Bayou Music Center
• May 10: Grand Prairie, TX — Texas Trust
• May 14: Phoenix, AZ — Celebrity Theatre
• May 15: Los Angeles, CA — The Novo
• May 17: Oakland, CA — Paramount Theatre

Floetry’s influence is measurable. “Floetic” was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America and received Grammy nominations for Best Contemporary R&B Album and Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals. “Say Yes” reached the Top 10 on Billboard’s Adult R&B chart and crossed into the Hot 100. More broadly, the duo helped normalize poetry as a structural element within commercial R&B rather than a novelty interlude.

Still, a reunion does not automatically equal restoration. The intervening years — and public commentary from both artists — underscore that the partnership has not been seamless.

What this tour represents is less a sentimental return than a recalibration. Floetry’s catalog remains intact. The question has always been whether the dynamic that produced it could function again in real time.

In 2026, audiences will see whether that chemistry still holds.

Police: Rapper iHeartMemphis Barricaded in Home, Livestreamed Standoff Before Arrest

Richard Colbert

Ten years ago, Richard Colbert — better known to the internet as iHeartMemphis — was the joyous face of the Vine era, teaching the world to "Hit the Quan" in a viral loop that felt like innocent, low-stakes fun.

On Tuesday, that nostalgia crashed through a garage door in South Florida along with a Tesla.

Colbert was arrested in Plantation, Florida, on charges of written threats to kill and resisting an officer without violence following a bizarre, seven-hour standoff with a SWAT team. It was a grim contrast to the dance crazes of 2015, trading the choreographed joy of a Billboard Top 20 hit for the chaotic, pixelated reality of a mental health crisis broadcast in real-time.

According to the Plantation Police Department, the rapper had barricaded himself inside a home on Gatehouse Road, leading to a tense exchange with authorities that neighbors say had been brewing since Monday. But the details captured on Colbert’s own Instagram Live painted a more erratic picture.

Amid footage that showed a gun and his own Tesla — which authorities eventually pulled through the garage door to gain entry — Colbert could be heard hurling insults at law enforcement and making declarations that veered between grandiosity and paranoia.

"Please, please save me y'all," he said at one point during the stream, claiming that clouds in the sky were spying on him. "I'm begging you. I don't got nothing. I don't want to hurt nobody."

Perhaps the most telling moment came when he addressed the audience directly, denying he was a danger to himself while invoking another polarized figure in hip-hop.

"Listen, I’m not Kanye," he told viewers, referencing Ye’s own public battles. 

For those who only remember the hook, iHeartMemphis was a defining architect of the mid-2010s "dance rap" bubble. His debut single "Hit the Quan" — inspired by Rich Homie Quan’s dance in the "Flex (Ooh, Ooh, Ooh)" video — peaked at No. 15 on the Billboard Hot 100. It was a massive commercial success that cemented his place in the digital zeitgeist.

Tuesday’s arrest is a stark reminder of the volatility that often waits on the other side of viral fame. Colbert was booked into the Broward County jail on the felony threats charge and remains in custody.

‘Jealous Kind of Fella’ Singer Garland Green Dead at 83

The cover art for Garland Green's 1969 debut album, "Jealous Kind of Fella," features the singer in his prime. Green, whose title track became a defining anthem of the Chicago soul era, died over the weekend at the age of 83. (Courtesy of Uni Records)

Chicago soul lost one of its essential voices this week.

Garland Green, the Mississippi-born, Chicago-bred singer whose 1969 hit “Jealous Kind of Fellow” became a defining anthem of romantic vulnerability in the late-’60s soul era, has died. He was 83.

The news was confirmed Monday in a public Facebook post by Marshall Thompson, founding member of The Chi-Lites, who wrote that Green “has passed away this morning” and described him as a Chicago hero who “will never be forgotten.” Additional details were not immediately available.

Born Garfield Green Jr. in Dunleith, Mississippi, in 1942, Green was the tenth of 11 children. He relocated to Chicago in 1958 during the latter wave of the Great Migration, arriving at 16 and immersing himself in the city’s rapidly evolving soul scene.

According to multiple biographical accounts, Green was discovered while singing in a pool hall, where local entrepreneur Argia B. Collins heard his voice and helped finance his musical training at the Chicago Conservatory of Music — a formative investment that refined his raw gospel-blues delivery into something both streetwise and orchestral.

 

His breakthrough came in 1969 with “Jealous Kind of Fellow,” released on Uni Records. The song climbed to No. 5 on Billboard’s R&B chart and No. 20 on the Billboard Hot 100, establishing Green as a prominent voice in Chicago’s lush, string-driven soul movement. The record’s restrained anguish — equal parts pleading and pride — made it a staple of dance floors and stepper culture for decades.

While the single remains his most widely recognized recording, Green maintained a steady presence in soul throughout the 1970s. He later recorded for Cotillion Records and worked alongside notable musicians of the era, including Donny Hathaway, further cementing his place within Chicago’s interconnected soul network.

 

Though his commercial visibility waned as disco and later R&B trends shifted, Green continued performing. He relocated to California in 1979 and recorded intermittently for independent labels before stepping away from the studio for an extended period.

He returned in 2012 with the album “I Should’ve Been the One,” a late-career project that demonstrated his voice retained its grit and emotional clarity. In recent years, he continued making select appearances, including performances well into his 80s.

Green’s passing marks another loss in the lineage of Chicago soul architects whose contributions often ran parallel to — but distinct from — Motown’s more heavily mythologized narrative. His catalog may not have been vast, but his signature record remains embedded in the city’s musical DNA.