Sunday, July 17, 2011

Rihanna

Robyn Rihanna Fenty (born February 20, 1988), better known as simply Rihanna (pronounced /riˈɑːnə/ ree-yah-na or /riˈænə/ ree-an-ə), is an R&B recording artist Born in Saint Michael, Barbados, Rihanna moved to the United States at the age of 16 to pursue a recording career under the guidance of record producer Evan Rogers. She subsequently signed a contract with Def Jam Recordings after auditioning for then-label head Jay-Z.
In 2005, Rihanna released her debut studio album, Music of the Sun, which peaked in the top ten of the Billboard 200 chart and features the Billboard Hot 100 hit single "Pon de Replay." Less than a year later, she released her second studio album, A Girl Like Me (2006), which peaked within the top five of the Billboard albums chart, and produced her first Hot 100 number one single, "SOS". Rihanna's third studio album, Good Girl Gone Bad (2007), spawned four chart-topping singles "Umbrella", "Take a Bow", "Disturbia" and "Don't Stop the Music", and was nominated for nine Grammy Awards, winning Best Rap/Sung Collaboration for "Umbrella," which features Jay-Z. Her fourth studio album Rated R, released in November 2009, produced the top 10 singles "Russian Roulette", "Hard" and "Rude Boy", which achieved the number-one spot on the Billboard Hot 100. Loud (2010), her fifth studio album, contains the number-one hits "Only Girl (In the World)", "What's My Name?" and "S&M".
Rihanna has sold more than 20 million albums and 60 million singles which makes her one of the best selling artists of all time. She is the youngest artist in Billboard charts history to achieved ten number-one singles on the Hot 100 As of March 2010, Rihanna has sold approximately 5.4 million album units and over 33,7 million digital singles in the United States. Billboard named Rihanna the Digital Songs Artist of the 2000s decade, and ranked her as the 17th Artist of the 2000s decade. She has received several accolades, including the 2007 World Music Awards for World's Best-Selling Pop Female Artist and Female Entertainer of the Year, and the 2011 Brit Award for Best International Female Solo Artist.She has also amassed a total of four Grammy Awards, four American Music Awards, and eighteen Billboard Music Awards.
Rihanna was born in Saint Michael, Barbados on February 20, 1988, to Monica, an accountant, and Ronald Fenty, a warehouse supervisor. Her mother, a native of Guyana, is Afro-Guyanese, and her father is of Barbadian and Irish descent. The eldest of three siblings, she has two younger brothers, Rorrey and Rajad Fenty. She began singing at around the age of seven.Her childhood was deeply affected by her father's addiction to crack cocaine and her parents' rocky marriage, which ended when she was fourteen years old, although, he remained a part of Rihanna's life. She grew up in a modest three-bed bungalow in Bridgetown and would sell clothes with her dad on a street stall
Rihanna attended Charles F. Broome Memorial School, a primary school in Barbados, and then the Combermere School.At Combermere School, she formed a musical trio with two of her classmates and won the Miss Combermere school beauty pageant.She was an army cadet in a sub-military programme that trained with the military of Barbados and Shontelle was her drill sergeant.
In December 2003, Rihanna met music producer Evan Rogers after a friend of Rihanna, who knew Rogers's wife, introduced her to them when Rogers and his Bajan-born wife were in Barbados for the holidays. Rihanna and her two bandmates auditioned for Rogers in his hotel room,who said that "the minute Rihanna walked into the room, it was like the other two girls didn't exist." While auditioning for Rogers, she sang Destiny's Child's cover of "Emotion".
He was impressed and invited her to record and write with him and Carl Sturken at their studio in New York.Over the next year, Rihanna and her mom shuttled back and forth to Rogers' home in Stamford, Connecticut. At 16, she relocated in the United States and moved in with Rogers and his wife. Carl Sturken helped her record a four-song demo, which included the ballad "Last Time", a cover of Whitney Houston's hit "For the Love of You", and what would become her first hit, "Pon de Replay", to send to various recording companies. It took a year to record the demos, because Rihanna was going to school and would only record during summer and Christmas school breaks. The demo caught the attention of an A&R executive at Def Jam, Jay Brown, and played it for the label's then-president, Jay-Z.

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