Kina Cosper (born January 25, 1969) known simply as Kina, is an American musician, best known for her work with

Grammy Award The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pr ...

-nominated group

Brownstone Brownstone is a brown Triassic–Jurassic sandstone that was historically a popular building material. The term is also used in the United States and Canada to refer to a townhouse clad in this or any other aesthetically similar material. Type ...

(after their nomination), and her 2000 solo single "Girl from the Gutter".

Biography

Solo career

Kina was born in

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...

. At age 21, she moved to Los Angeles, where she worked as a server and in clerical positions as she tried to establish a musical career. She found success with her single "Girl from the Gutter", which received strong airplay and peaked at number 21 on the Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. She then released her self-titled debut album on July 18, 2000. ''Kina'' peaked at number 14 on the ''Billboard'' Heatseekers chart. "Girl from the Gutter" was followed by the single "Me", which peaked at number 3 on the same chart. "Have a Cry" was released to radio but never charted. To date this is Kina's only released album. Kina parted ways with

DreamWorks Records DreamWorks Records (often referred in copyright notices as SKG Music, LLC) was an American record label founded in 1996 by David Geffen, Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg as a subsidiary of DreamWorks Pictures. The label operated until 20 ...

shortly after the final single release. A few years after their release, Kina's songs began popping up in various TV shows. In fall 2005 "Give & Take" and "I Love You" both appeared in an episode of the UPN sitcom '' Girlfriends''. Kina's song "Sincerely" was also featured in the motion picture '' Beauty Shop''.

Discography

Albums

*'' Kina'' (2000)

Singles

*"Girl from the Gutter" (2000) *"Me" (2000) *"Have a Cry" (2000)

References

External links

* Allmusic Kina page {{Authority control 1969 births Living people African-American rock singers American contemporary R&B singers American women pop singers American women singer-songwriters American rhythm and blues singer-songwriters Singers from Detroit 20th-century American women singers 21st-century American women singers 20th-century American singers 21st-century American singers African-American songwriters African-American women musicians 20th-century African-American women singers 21st-century African-American women singers Singer-songwriters from Michigan