Oprah Winfrey reveals real name Orpah and calls 1998 theme song a career mistake

Oprah Winfrey, 72, appeared on Keke Palmer’s podcast Baby, This Is Keke Palmer and disclosed that the name on her birth certificate is Orpah, a biblical name from the Book of Ruth. She said she did not learn of the discrepancy until she was about twenty years old, explaining that the spelling error and mispronunciation led people to call her Oprah, and the changed name stuck for five decades.

During the same interview Winfrey reflected on a brief musical detour from 1998, when she recorded the gospel‑style song “Run On” as the theme for season 13 of The Oprah Winfrey Show. She described the recording as “one of the mistakes of my career,” noting that she realized she could not sing despite taking lessons, that a church choir could not salvage the track, and that the song was used for only one season. She also recalled that Whitney Houston once sang the tune on her show.

Key quotations include: “It was Orpah from the Bible,” and “That is one of the mistakes of my career.”