Whitney Houston

Whitney Elizabeth Houston, known as Whitney Houston (Newark, August 9, 1963 - Beverly Hills, February 11, 2012 [3]), was an American singer and actress.
Is universally recognized as one of the most iconic, popular and talented singers of all time, [4] often simply called "The Voice" for the unique features of his voice, a nickname given to her by Oprah Winfrey. [5] According to many artists and critics, that Whitney was the greatest female voice in music history. [6]
His great success in the eighties led to the opening of markets hitherto closed to singers of color. [7] With them the singer has topped the world charts, especially the Billboard Hot 100, in which he placed seven singles the consecutive number one, [8] breaking the record of five belonging to Diana Ross & The Supremes and the Beatles. Its total sales of albums, singles and videos are currently more than 200 million copies, and appears to be the female artist from the most successful ever after Madonna and Mariah Carey. [9]
It was one of the most successful women record, the fourth woman to number of sales in the United States, with about 55 million records certified by the RIAA. [10] He also holds the top spot in the ranking of the most successful artists of color along with Michael Jackson.
In 2008, the Guinness Book of World Records said Whitney artist most awarded and popular in the world. [11] The artist has won six Grammy Awards and holds the record for number of American Music Awards, having received 22 in all. In 2012, the Guinness Book of World Records has cited again the singer as the first and only artist to have 12 tracks simultaneously in the UK chart, which is a world record. [12] Whitney Houston has been inserted at the 34th position in the list of the 100 greatest singers of all time of Rolling Stone magazine. [13]
After a period of decline in the 2000s due to harsh personal stories and lawsuits against former husband, in June 2009 the record company Arista Records announced the release of the album titled I Look to You, published in Italy and Germany August 28, 2009 and in the US on 31 August.
She died on 11 February 2012, in the room of a hotel in Beverly Hills. [14] The cause of death was identified nell'annegamento accidentally in the bath, as a result of excessive intake of drugs and vascular disease ( atherosclerosis). [15] She was born August 9, 1963 in Newark, New Jersey, by John R. Houston and Emily Drinkard Houston (better known as Cissy), and raised in East Orange, has two brothers, Michael and Gary. His mother has long been a singer in the group soul Sweet Inspirations, the group that made the tour and provided voices support for Elvis Presley and Aretha Franklin, and has also been a member of the gospel group Drinkard Sisters, along with his nephews and cousins ​​of Whitney, Dionne and Dee Dee Warwick. [16] Whitney Houston has spent part of his adolescence frequenting nightclubs where her mother was singing and occasionally took the stage to perform with her. As a child, at the age of nine, he began to sing in the choir at New Hope Baptist Church until becoming a soloist at the age of 11 years.1977 - 1984: the beginnings
In 1977, at age 14, was a singer in the individual support of Michael Zager Band's Life's a Party. Zager subsequently offered the young singer a recording contract, but Cissy disagreed, wanting her daughter to finish school first. In 1978, at age 15, as he sang background vocals on the single of Chaka Khan I'm Every Woman, song that later became a hit for its soundtrack album sales champion Bodyguard. In the early eighties, he began working as a model after a photographer saw her sing at Carnegie Hall with her mother. [17] Given its obvious artistic skills, his parents decided to formally launch his career in 1981, after graduating . Then chose the Tara Productions, with which he signed. Appeared as a soloist in the album Paul Jabara and Friends of Paul Jabara, released by Columbia Records in 1983, where she sang Eternal love. [18]
Appeared in Seventeen and became one of the first women of color to grace the cover of the magazine. Also appeared on the cover, in magazines Glamour, Cosmopolitan, Vogue, Miss Young and in a TV commercial Drink Canada Dry. While she was modeling, she continued her burgeoning recording career, during which he had received many offers of registration agencies (Michael Zager in 1980 and Elektra Records in 1981), working with producers Ben Dover, Bill Laswell and Martin Bisi on an album called One Down, Group Materials. For this project, contributed to the ballad Memories. In 1983, the manager of Arista Clive Davis saw Whitney sing and, impressed, offered her a recording contract in the world, that Whitney signed, and engaged in the development of his career. He sang as voice support in album Lou Rawls and Jermaine Jackson and initially recorded the duet with Teddy Pendergrass Hold Me, which appeared on his album, Love Language, single which was released in 1984 and became a Top 5 R & B hit, constituting a first big hit for the singer. Moreover, it showed for the first time on television in 1983 at The Merv Griffin Show, singing the song Home of Diana Ross and performing a medley with her mother.