Mariah Carey
Mariah Carey (born March 27, 1970) is an American singer-songwriter, record producer, and actress. She made her recording debut with the release of her eponymous studio album in 1990, under the guidance of Columbia Records executive Tommy Mottola, whom she later married in 1993. The album was followed by worldwide commercial success, Music Box (1993) and Merry Christmas (1994), with the former becoming one of the best-selling albums of all time. Both albums established Carey as Columbia's highest-selling act, and eventually the best-selling artist on the decade. During the recording of her subsequent release, Daydream (1996), Carey began to deviate from her pop background, and slowly traversing into R&B and hip-hop. This musical, as well as personal, transformation took full form with Butterfly, which she considered her magnum opus, due to the personal themes it touched on.
Carey left Columbia in 2000, and signed a record-breaking $100 million recording contract with Virgin Records. In 2001, Carey ventured into film with Glitter (2001). After being hospitalized for severe exhaustion, and the film's poor reception, Carey's contract was bought out for $50 million, and led to a slump in her career. She signed a multi-million dollar contract deal with Island Records in 2002, and after a relatively unsuccessful period, returned to the top of music with The Emancipation of Mimi (2005). It became the best-selling album by a solo artist globally of that year, spurred by the succss of "We Belong Together", which became the most successful solo single of her music career, and was named the "Song of the Decade" by Billboard. Following Carey's success with The Emancipation of Mimi, she once again ventured into film, and starred in Precious (2009). Her role in the film was met with critical acclaim; she was awarded the "Breakthrough Performance Award" at the Palm Springs International Film Festival, and a NAACP Image Award nomination.
In a career spanning over two decades, Carey has sold more than 200 million records worldwide, making her one of the best-selling music artists of all time. Carey was cited as the world’s best-selling recording artist of the 1990s at the World Music Awards in 1998, and was named the best-selling female artist of the millennium by the same award show in 2000. According to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), she is the third best-selling female artist and seventeenth artist over-all in the United States, with 63 million certified albums. With the release of "Touch My Body" (2008), Carey gained her eighteenth number one single in the United States, more than any other solo artist. Additionally, she remains the best-selling international artist in Japan, and holds the top four best-selling albums by a non-Asian artist there. Aside from her commercial accomplishments, Carey has won five Grammy Awards, seventeen World Music Awards, eleven American Music Awards and twenty-eight Billboard Music Awards. As part of her artistry, she is often cited as one of the most influential voices in pop music, and is credited for her five-octave vocal range, power, melismatic style and signature use of the whistle register.
