Questlove Shares Poignant D’Angelo Tribute

An outpouring of tributes were shared in response to the untimely death of influential musician D’Angelo earlier this month. Questlove wrote a special tribute to D’Angelo, The Roots drummer’s longtime friend and collaborator, that was published by Rolling Stone.

D’Angelo, who succumbed to pancreatic cancer on October 14 at age 51, was a central figure in the R&B and neo-soul movement of the 1990s and 2000s. Questlove, The Roots and D’Angelo were part of what became called the Soulquarians collective, the influential late-’90s/early-2000s movement that also included J Dilla, Erykah Badu, Common, Bilal, Q-Tip, James Poyser and others.

D’Angelo rose to prominence behind his 1995 debut album, Brown Sugar and its landmark follow-up, 2000’s Voodoo. Several years passed before the 2014 arrival of D’Angelo’s third and final album, Black Messiah.

Questlove contributed extensively to Voodoo and Black Messiah and toured with D’Angelo on multiple occasions. D’Angelo appeared in Questlove’s 2025 Sly Stone documentary entitled Sly Lives! (a.k.a. The Burden of Black Genius).

Writing for Rolling Stone, Questlove titled his article honoring D’Angelo, “The Burial of Black Genius (a.k.a. D’Angelo Lives!).” Calling D’Angelo “one of the last pure artists in Black music,” Questlove went into detail about how their friendship developed over time and remained close up until the end.

In his heartfelt remembrance, Questlove shared the following about D’Angelo’s final days:

“I have to say, the last weeks with him were probably the best for our friendship. Music was always the template for our communication. Now here we were in the hospital — no soundproof separation booths, no drums, no keys, no instruments, no musicians. Nothing but just the two of us talking. About where our lives had been in the past five years or so.

“I’ll admit that the uncertain finality of it all was somewhat awkward for me. Is this visit gonna be my last visit? Is this concert gonna be the last one we watch together? Will this be the last J Dilla beat we lose our minds over? Man … since that day back in 1996, talking about our hometowns and high school and our churches and our fathers and how we escaped it all, we hadn’t talked all that deep.”

Adding further to his tribute to D’Angelo, Questlove read aloud the article he wrote for Rolling Stone, which can be seen in the clips below: