She is an Colombian Latin pop-rock singer. There are very few Latin American pop-rock music stars who have achieved international success as explosive as Shakira, a performer and composer in Spanish and English who has achieved a very prominent position in the fields of both languages.
– Losing my voice was the darkest moment of my life –
Shakira Biography
She was borned into a middle-class family and she was the daughter of William Mebarak, of Lebanese descent, and Nidia Ripoll, a Colombian with Catalan ancestors.
Since she had fice years old she was showing signs of her artistic vocation, demonstrating her remarkable talent in the interpretation of Arab dances and songs. Not in vain her name, Shakira, means “full of grace” in Arabic.
At the age of eight she composed her first song, Your dark glasses, which she dedicated to her father. She, like her mother, soon understood what her daughter’s vocation was, that she began an artistic career as a child, appearing on radio and television programs.
Shakira Career
At the age of ten, she was already writing songs systematically; She first participated in the television contest Looking for a Child Artist in 1988, in which she was the winner, and she repeated the triumph in 1989 and 1990.
As a teenager, she signed her first recording contract with Sony Music Colombia, a label for which she recorded her first album, Magia (1991), with songs she had composed between the ages of eight and thirteen, which was followed two years later by a second album. , Danger (1993).
Her personality immediately impacted the public and music journalists; she was chosen to represent Colombia at the OTI Festival, but she could not attend because she was under sixteen.
The great opportunity came when she was invited to participate in the Viña del Mar Song Festival in 1993. It was then that, at just sixteen years old, her interpretation of the ballad Eres opened the doors of the Latin American market for her.
While finishing her high school studies, she prepared what would be her third album, Barefoot Feet (1995). The album, which included, in addition to the title track, other hits such as I’m here , White dreams and Where are you, heart? , was a success throughout Latin America, with more than four million copies sold; Her songs became extraordinary hits and won her millions of fans.
Her next album, Where are the thieves? (1998), produced by Emilio Estefan, made her the undisputed star of Latin pop-rock, with more than eight million copies sold.
Some of the songs contained in this album (nominated for a Grammy award and which remained for more than a year in the top ten of the Soundscand in the United States), such as the one that gives it its title or Inevitable, Tú, Ojos Así and Ciega, deaf-mute , redoubled her popularity and projected her figure in international markets.
To establish her growing popularity in the United States, the singer recorded Shakira MTV Unplugged (1999) in New York, a live concert with a special Latin flavor that was the first acoustic performance broadcast in Spanish by MTV in that country. For this work, Shakira won her first Grammy (for best Latin pop album) and the Latin Grammys for best pop singer (for Ojos Así ) and best rock singer (for Octavo día ).
Aware of the potential of the Anglo-Saxon market, she then decided to go a step further in her career and wrote a new album: Servicio de laundromat/Laundry Service (2001), with nine songs in English, including Underneath Your Clothes and Whenever, Wherever , and four in Spanish.
The album was number one in Argentina, Australia, Austria, Canada, Mexico, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland, and was her worldwide consecration, with more than 13 million copies sold. The album’s presentation tour, the “Mongoose Tour“, lasted six months (from November 2002 to May 2003) and left the DVD Live and Off the Record (2004) to remember.
Four years after Laundry Service , the Colombian, who did not stop composing during all this time, surprised with the publication, a few months apart, of two new albums: Oral Fixation Vol. 1 , in Spanish (June 2005 ), and Oral Fixation Vol. 2 , in English (November 2005).
The first included themes such as Torture , played in a duet with Alejandro Sanz, La pared or Las de la intuición . In just three days worldwide sales reached one million copies. The video for Torture was also the first in Spanish to be regularly scheduled on MTV and VH1.
In the meantime she collaborated with artists such as Alejandro Sanz ( I thank you, but no ), Beyoncé ( Beautiful Liar ) or Miguel Bosé ( If you do not come back ) and co – wrote and recorded two songs for the film version of El amor
en los tiempo del cólera , a celebrated novel by his compatriot Gabriel García Márquez .
Oral Fixation Vol. 2 was not far behind the success of this album , with which, like the previous one, the singer broke her own records. One of her singles, Hips Don’t Lie , which featured rapper/producer Wyclef Jean, was the best-selling single of 2006; it reached number 1 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and made Shakira the only Colombian artist to do so.
It was also a digital phenomenon: in a single week, 266,500 downloads of the song were recorded. The awards were immediate: Oral fixation Vol. 1
In 2006, she won, among others, the Grammy for best Latin rock/alternative album, the Latin Grammy for best album of the year and six Billboard awards for the best of Latin music.
With both versions in English and Spanish, the Colombian superstar undertook an ambitious tour in June 2006 that took her to one hundred and forty cities in North America, Latin America, Europe, Africa and Southeast Asia. The tour lasted until July 2007 and was followed live by more than four million people.
She Wolf included songs like Loba or Gypsy(in whose promotional video she was accompanied by the Spanish tennis player Rafa Nadal ), which brought her back to the forefront of today.
In the summer of 2010, after presenting her own perfume, S by Shakira, the Colombian singer was in charge of saying goodbye to the Soccer World Cup in South Africa, to the rhythm of Waka, waka , a new version of the Cameroonian song Zangalewo and anthem World Cup official.
A few days later she moved to Barcelona (a city with which she declared herself in love with her), where she recorded the presentation video for her new album, Sale el sol , this time in Spanish. Sale el sol , in which a collaboration with Calle 13 stood out, appeared in October and was presented on a new tour, “El Tour de las Delicias”, which would stop in Spain in November.
Despite living in the firmament of popularity, she has not gone to her head. For years she has combined her artistic career with humanitarian causes.
In the mid-1990s, she created the Pies Descalzos Foundation, dedicated to helping child victims of violence in Colombia, providing them with educational, nutritional, psychological, and medical services.
She also founded ALAS (Latin America in Solidarity Action), a non-profit institution that aspires to promote early childhood development in Latin America. In 2003 she was named a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, and in 2006 she received the Spirit of Hope award for her humanitarian work.
Shakira Awards
On April 27 of that same year, she won six Latin Billboard Awards and was chosen to sing her song Hips Dont Lie at the final ceremony of the FIFA World Cup , Germany 2006.
In 2007, she collaborated with her friend Alejandro Sanz, in the album The Train of Moments in the song I thank you, but no , and in the same year, in a song and the music video titled Beautiful Liar with the American singer Beyoncé , corresponding to her album ” BDay “.
On October 12, 2009, she released Ella she Wolf their sixth studio album. On June 29, 2009, she released the Spanish version of the first single titled Loba (Ella She Wolf in English).
The album was a chart success, going Gold in Russia, Ireland, Switzerland, Poland, France, Argentina, Greece and Hungary, Platinum in Spain, the UK and the Middle East, 2X Platinum in Colombia and Mexico, and 3 times Platinum in Taiwan.
Shakira Net Worth
Shakira fulfilled the dream of many artists: to succeed in the world of music, conquer the whole world and win a huge fortune, which today is valued at 300 million dollars, according to information provided by the site Celebrity Net Worth.
Shakira Couples And Childrens
Since 2000, she was sharing her life with Antonio de la Rúa, son of former Argentine President Fernando de la Rúa; the wedding rumors intensified around 2007, without coming to fruition, which fueled the breakup rumors.
In 2010, the singer herself confirmed that they had separated amicably.
Since 2011 she has been romantically linked to the FC Barcelona footballer Gerard Piqué, a romance that, like the previous one, has flooded the pages of the pink press.
