Whitney Houston American Singer and Actress (1963–2012)

Early life

Whitney Elizabeth Houston was born on 9 August 1963 in Newark, New Jersey. Her mother, Cissy Houston, was a gospel and soul singer who had performed with the Drinkard Singers and founded the Sweet Inspirations, and her father, John Russell Houston Jr., worked as an administrator in the city government. The family later moved to East Orange, New Jersey.

Houston grew up in the Baptist church. She joined the choir at New Hope Baptist Church in Newark at five, learned piano there and gave her first solo performance at twelve. Her mother trained her voice through her teenage years. She went to Mount Saint Dominic Academy, a Catholic girls' high school in Caldwell, New Jersey, and graduated in 1981.

Career

At fourteen Houston began singing backing vocals in her mother's act, and in 1978 she took her first solo at a Manhattan performance. She worked as a session singer for artists including Chaka Khan and Lou Rawls, and in 1980 started a modelling career that put her on the cover of Seventeen. After Arista Records executive Clive Davis saw her perform in a New York club, she signed with the label on 10 April 1983, with her parents present.

Her debut album, Whitney Houston, appeared on 14 February 1985. It reached number one on the Billboard 200 in March 1986 and stayed there for 14 weeks. Three of its singles, "Saving All My Love for You", "How Will I Know" and "Greatest Love of All", reached number one on the Hot 100. The follow-up, Whitney (1987), made her the first woman to enter the US chart at number one, and its singles "I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)", "Didn't We Almost Have It All", "So Emotional" and "Where Do Broken Hearts Go" all topped the Hot 100. With the last of these she became the first act to place seven consecutive singles at number one, passing the Beatles and the Bee Gees. She also recorded "One Moment in Time" for the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul.

Houston took a more urban sound on I'm Your Baby Tonight (1990), the first album on which she was executive producer. On 27 January 1991 she sang "The Star-Spangled Banner" at Super Bowl XXV in Tampa during the Gulf War. A recording of the performance reached the US top 20, and she donated her share of the proceeds to the American Red Cross.

Her acting debut came in The Bodyguard (1992), opposite Kevin Costner. Its soundtrack topped the Billboard 200 for 20 weeks, and her version of Dolly Parton's "I Will Always Love You" spent 14 weeks at number one on the Hot 100. She then starred in Waiting to Exhale (1995), The Preacher's Wife (1996), whose soundtrack became the best-selling gospel album, and played the Fairy Godmother in the television film Cinderella (1997), which she also co-produced through her company BrownHouse Productions. With the partner of that company, Debra Martin Chase, she also produced The Princess Diaries and The Cheetah Girls.

My Love Is Your Love (1998) was her first studio album in eight years. In 2001 she renewed her contract with Arista for 100 million dollars. Later albums included Just Whitney (2002), the seasonal One Wish: The Holiday Album (2003) and I Look to You (2009), which entered the Billboard 200 at number one. Her last film role was in Sparkle, released in August 2012, where she also served as an executive producer.

Recognition

Houston won six competitive Grammy Awards, among them Album of the Year for The Bodyguard soundtrack at the 1994 ceremony and Record of the Year and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance for "I Will Always Love You". She also received an Emmy Award for a Grammy-ceremony performance of "Saving All My Love for You", a Sports Emmy for "One Moment in Time", and many American Music Awards and Billboard Music Awards. In 2000 she was given an NRJ Music Award for International Album of the Year for My Love Is Your Love. She was inducted into the New Jersey Hall of Fame in 2013 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2020, and the Billboard Millennium Award is also among her honours.

Public roles

In 1989 she founded the Whitney Houston Foundation for Children, a nonprofit organisation supporting children with a range of needs. She performed at the 1988 Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute concert at Wembley Stadium, and in 1994 played three concerts in South Africa after Mandela's election. After her Super Bowl performance she joined the American Red Cross Board of Governors.

Personal life

Houston married the singer Bobby Brown in 1992, and they divorced in 2007. Their daughter was Bobbi Kristina Brown.

Houston died on 11 February 2012 in Beverly Hills, California.