Voletta Wallace, the mother of rap legend The Notorious B.I.G., has passed away at the age of 78. Billboard confirmed her death on Friday (Feb. 21) through the Monroe County Coroner’s Office in Pennsylvania.
“Voletta has died, on hospice care, at her residence in Stroudsburg, Penn.,” Monroe County Coroner Thomas Yanac told Billboard. “Voletta died of natural causes.”
Wallace’s passing was first reported by TMZ, which was later confirmed by a representative of The Notorious B.I.G.’s estate.
Originally from Jamaica, Wallace immigrated to the United States and gave birth to Christopher Wallace—who would later be known as The Notorious B.I.G.—on May 21, 1972, in Brooklyn. She worked as a preschool teacher and raised her son as a single mother.
Biggie rose to fame in the 1990s as a defining voice in East Coast hip-hop, signing with Diddy’s Bad Boy Records. His debut album, Ready to Die, established him as a superstar, while his follow-up, Life After Death, debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart. The album was released just weeks after he was tragically shot and killed in Los Angeles on March 9, 1997, at the age of 24.
His music remains a cornerstone of hip-hop’s “golden era” of the 1990s, with classics like “Juicy,” “Hypnotize,” “Ten Crack Commandments,” “Going Back to Cali,” and “Mo Money Mo Problems.”
Following her son’s death, Wallace dedicated herself to preserving his legacy. She founded the Christopher Wallace Memorial Foundation and played an active role in managing his estate. She also served as a producer on Notorious, the 2009 biopic about Biggie’s life, in which she was portrayed by Angela Bassett.
In 2020, The Notorious B.I.G. was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and Wallace attended the ceremony to accept the honor on his behalf. “Today, I’m feeling great,” she told Billboard at the time. “As a mother, I’m extremely proud of his accomplishments. You know, I still see such a young man at a young age, and sadly, he’s not here to witness all this. But it’s an astute honour, and as a mother, I’m just elated for that.”
In recent months, Wallace’s Instagram account shared updates celebrating her son’s enduring impact on hip-hop, including his 992 million streams on Spotify in 2024 and over 2.5 billion all-time streams on Apple Music.
She is survived by her grandchildren, C.J. Wallace and T’yanna Wallace, the children of The Notorious B.I.G.
