Aaliyah Dana Haughton (; January 16, 1979 – August 25, 2001) was an American singer and actress. She has been credited for helping to redefine
contemporary R&B,
pop
Pop or POP may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Music
* Pop music, a musical genre Artists
* POP, a Japanese idol group now known as Gang Parade
* Pop!, a UK pop group
* Pop! featuring Angie Hart, an Australian band
Albums
* ''Pop'' (G ...
and
hip hop,
earning her the
nicknames the "Princess of R&B" and "Queen of Urban Pop".
Born in
Brooklyn but raised in Detroit, she first gained recognition at the age of 10, when she appeared on the television show ''
Star Search'' and performed in concert alongside
Gladys Knight. At the age of 12, Aaliyah signed with
Jive Records
Jive Records was an American independent record label founded by Clive Calder in 1981 as a subsidiary to the Zomba Group. In the US, the label had offices in New York City and Chicago. Jive was best known for its successes with hip hop, R&B, an ...
and her uncle
Barry Hankerson's
Blackground Records. Hankerson introduced her to
R. Kelly
Robert Sylvester Kelly (born January 8, 1967) is an American singer, songwriter, record producer, and sex offender convicted of racketeering and multiple sex offenses.
During his recording career, Kelly sold over 75 million records worldwid ...
, who became her mentor, as well as lead songwriter and producer of her debut album, ''
Age Ain't Nothing but a Number''. The album sold three million copies in the United States and was certified double platinum by the
Recording Industry Association of America
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
(RIAA). After allegations of an
illegal marriage
Illegal, or unlawful, typically describes something that is explicitly prohibited by law, or is otherwise forbidden by a state or other governing body.
Illegal may also refer to:
Law
* Violation of law
* Crime, the practice of breaking the c ...
with Kelly, Aaliyah ended her contract with Jive and signed with
Atlantic Records
Atlantic Recording Corporation (simply known as Atlantic Records) is an American record label founded in October 1947 by Ahmet Ertegun and Herb Abramson. Over its first 20 years of operation, Atlantic earned a reputation as one of the most i ...
.
Aaliyah worked with record producers
Timbaland and
Missy Elliott
Melissa Arnette Elliott (born July 1, 1971), better known as Missy Elliott or Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliot, is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, and record producer. She embarked on her music career with R&B girl group Sista in the earl ...
for her second album, ''
One in a Million'', which sold three million copies in the United States and more than eight million copies worldwide. In 2000, Aaliyah appeared in her first film, ''
Romeo Must Die''. She contributed to the film's soundtrack, which spawned the single "
Try Again". The song topped the
''Billboard'' Hot 100 solely on
airplay, making Aaliyah the first artist in ''
Billboard
A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...
'' history to achieve this goal. After completing ''Romeo Must Die'', Aaliyah filmed her role in ''
Queen of the Damned'', and released, in 2001, her
self-titled third and final studio album, which topped the
''Billboard'' 200.
On August 25, 2001, Aaliyah died at the age of 22 in
an airplane accident in the Bahamas, when the overloaded aircraft she was traveling in crashed shortly after takeoff, killing all nine on board. The pilot was later found to have traces of
cocaine and alcohol in his body and was not qualified to fly the aircraft designated for the flight. Aaliyah's family later filed a
wrongful death lawsuit against the aircraft's operator,
Blackhawk International Airways, which was settled out of court. In the decades since her death, Aaliyah's music has continued to achieve commercial success, aided by several posthumous releases. She has sold 8.1 million albums in the US and an estimated 24 to 32 million albums worldwide. ''Billboard'' lists her as the tenth most successful female R&B artist of the past 25 years, and the 27th most successful in history.
Her accolades include three
American Music Awards and two
MTV VMAs
The MTV Video Music Awards (commonly abbreviated as the VMAs) is an award show presented by the cable channel MTV to honour the best in the music video medium. Originally conceived as an alternative to the Grammy Awards (in the video category) ...
, along with five
Grammy Award nominations.
Early life
Aaliyah Dana Haughton was born on January 16, 1979, in Brooklyn, New York,
and was the younger child of Diane and Michael "Miguel" Haughton, a
warehouse worker (1951–2012).
She was of
African-American descent.
[ ] Her name is the feminine form of the
Arabic "
Ali" meaning "highest, most exalted one, the best."
[Sutherland 2005, 2–4.] The singer was highly fond of her name, calling it "beautiful" and asserting she was "very proud of it" and strove to live up to her name every day.
Aaliyah's mother enrolled Aaliyah in voice lessons at an early age.
She started performing at weddings, church choir and charity events. When Aaliyah was five years old, her family moved to Detroit, Michigan, where she was raised along with her older brother,
Rashad Rashad is a given name which may refer to:
Surname:
*Ahmad Rashad (born 1949), American football player and sportcaster
*Ali Akbar Rashad (born 1955), Iranian philosopher and Islamic scholar
*Isaiah Rashad (born 1991), American rapper
*Phylicia Ras ...
.
She attended a
Catholic school, Gesu Elementary, where in first grade she was cast in the stage play ''
Annie
Annie may refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Annie (given name), a given name and a list of people and fictional characters with the name
* Annie (actress) (born 1975), Indian actress
* Annie (singer) (born 1977), Norwegian singer
The ...
,'' which inspired her to become an entertainer.
[ In Detroit, her father began working in the warehouse business, one of his brother-in-law Barry Hankerson's widening interests. Her mother stayed home and raised Aaliyah and her brother.]
Aaliyah's mother was a vocalist, and her uncle, Barry Hankerson, was an entertainment lawyer who had been married to Gladys Knight. As a child, Aaliyah traveled with Knight and worked with an agent in New York to audition for commercials and television programs, including '' Family Matters''; she went on to appear on '' Star Search'' at the age of ten. Aaliyah chose to begin auditioning. Her mother made the decision to drop her surname. She auditioned for several record labels and at age 11 appeared in concerts alongside Knight. She had several pet animals during her childhood, including ducks, snakes and iguanas. Her cousin Jomo had a pet alligator, which Aaliyah felt was too much, remarking, "that was something I wasn't going to stroke."
Education
When she was growing up, Aaliyah attended Detroit schools and believed she was well-liked, but got teased for her short stature. She recalled coming into her own prior to age 15 and grew to love her height. Her mother would tell her to be happy that she was small and compliment her. Other children disliked Aaliyah, but she did not stay focused on them. "You always have to deal with people who are jealous, but there were so few it didn't even matter. The majority of kids supported me, which was wonderful. When it comes to dealing with negative people, I just let it in one ear and out the other. Those people were invisible to me." Even in her adult life, she considered herself small. She had "learned to accept and love" herself and added: "... the most important thing is to think highly of yourself because if you don't, no one else will".[
During her audition for acceptance to the Detroit High School for the Fine and Performing Arts, Aaliyah sang the song " Ave Maria" in its entirety in the Italian language.] Aaliyah, who maintained a perfect 4.0 grade-point average when graduating from high school, felt education was important. She saw fit to keep her grades up despite the pressures and time constraints brought on her during the early parts of her career. She labeled herself as a perfectionist and recalled always being a good student. Aaliyah reflected: "I always wanted to maintain that, even in high school when I first started to travel. I wanted to keep that 4.0. Being in the industry, you know, I don't want kids to think, 'I can just sing and forget about school.' I think it's very important to have an education, and even more important to have something to fall back on." She did this in her own life, as she planned to "fall back on" another part of the entertainment industry. She believed that she could teach music history or open her own school to teach that or drama if she did not make a living as a recording artist because, as she reasoned, "when you pick a career it has to be something you love".
Career
1991–1995: ''Age Ain't Nothing but a Number''
After Hankerson signed a distribution deal with Jive Records
Jive Records was an American independent record label founded by Clive Calder in 1981 as a subsidiary to the Zomba Group. In the US, the label had offices in New York City and Chicago. Jive was best known for its successes with hip hop, R&B, an ...
, he signed Aaliyah to his Blackground Records label at the age of 12. Hankerson later introduced her to recording artist and producer R. Kelly
Robert Sylvester Kelly (born January 8, 1967) is an American singer, songwriter, record producer, and sex offender convicted of racketeering and multiple sex offenses.
During his recording career, Kelly sold over 75 million records worldwid ...
, who became Aaliyah's mentor, as well as lead songwriter and producer of her first album, which was recorded when she was 14. Aaliyah's debut album, '' Age Ain't Nothing but a Number'', was released under her mononym "Aaliyah", by Jive and Blackground Records on May 24, 1994; the album debut at number 24 on the ''Billboard'' 200 chart, selling 38,000 copies in its first week. It ultimately peaked at number 18 on the ''Billboard'' 200 and it was certified two times Platinum by the RIAA
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
. To date the album has sold over 3 million copies in the US.[ In Canada, the album was certified gold by ]Music Canada
Music Canada (formerly Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA)) is a non-profit trade organization that was founded 9 April 1963 to represent the interests of companies that record, manufacture, produce, and distribute music in Canada. It a ...
for 50,000 copies in shipments. In 2014, '' Vibe'' magazine estimated that the album had sold six million copies globally.
Upon its release, ''Age Ain't Nothing But a Number'' received generally favorable reviews from music critics. Some writers noted that Aaliyah's "silky vocals" and "sultry voice" blended with Kelly's new jack swing
New jack swing, new jack, or swingbeat is a fusion genre of the rhythms and production techniques of hip hop and dance-pop, and the urban contemporary sound of R&B. Spearheaded by producers Teddy Riley and Bernard Belle, new jack swing was mos ...
helped define