MOST TALENTED AND LUCKIEST CELEBRITIES
MARIAH CAREY
Name:
Mariah Carey. Height: 5'.9". Nationality: American. Date:
March 27, 1970. Birth Place: Huntington, New York, USA. Occupation:
Actress, singer. Education: Oldfield Middle School Harborfields High
School (graduated in 1987). Husband: Tommy Mottola (Sony record
executive producer; married on June 5, 1993; divorced in March 1998).
Relationship: Luis Miguel (Puerto Rican; musician), Derek Jeter (New York
Yankees' player). Father: Alfred Roy Carey
(African-American/Venezuelan; aeronautical engineer; divorced in 1973).
Mother: Patricia Hickey (Irish-American; a former opera singer with the
New York City Opera and a vocal coach). Sister: Alison (older).
Brother: Morgan (older). Claim to fame: Album: Mariah Carey (1990).
Agent: Mariah Carey, P.O. Box 679, Bradford, CT 06405, USA.
BIOGRAPHY SYNOPSIS: You’d want the Billboard Artist of the Decade for the 1990s to be a singer who had a number one recording in each of those ten years and whose incredible virtuosity of voice is unmatched by any other popular music artist. It could only be Mariah Carey, and, indeed, it was. She received the title in December, 1999. It all began when Carey’s opera singer/vocal coach mother recognized and nurtured her daughter’s precocious perfect pitch, and encouraged the youngster to sing for friends, festivals and talent shows. The sweet voiced singer began to write her own songs in junior high, and throughout high school commuted to Manhattan from her New York home to further her music studies. In 1987, at age 17, she graduated and threw herself into the usual odd jobs and part-time backup vocals work that marks the early career of many aspiring performers. It was during one of those backup sessions that she grabbed her chance and passed a demo tape to Sony Music Entertainment President Tommy Mottola. The music industry big-wig was impressed and signed her to a recording contract. Carey has a reported seven octave range (that’s a whole piano’s worth), and it was her impossibly high, clear grace notes and scat sequences that made those otherwise fluffy pop tunes unique. Her debut album, Emotions (1991) sold six million copies, and two of the singles hit number one on the charts. Seven Billboard awards, two Grammys, plus a cartload of American Music, Soul Train, and New York City Music awards later, the new star recorded Music Box (1993). That year, as well, she married Mottola in a star-studded and hugely expensive fairy-tale ceremony. Music’s “royal couple” continued to crank out award-winning chart-topping hits, with Merry Christmas (1994), Daydream (1995), Butterfly (1997), and #1s (1998). Collaborative works, Diana, Princess of Wales: Tribute (1997) and VH-1 Divas Live (1998) were hugely popular as well. Carey and Mottola divorced in 1998, but the music went on -- the singer/song writer recorded Rainbow in 1999. Every Carey album has included more that its share of number one hits. Every one has garnered the artist glittering heaps of awards -- so many that the 29-year-old artist is now being presented the sort of “special honor” awards reserved for lifetime achievers. Her career record sales stand at 105 million. What more could a girl possibly want? Why, movie-stardom, that’s what. Carey broke into acting in 1999 with the feature film The Bachelor. A second, All That Glitters, is currently in pre-production. If the performer’s incredible success in the music business translates to the big screen, then Hollywood can expect another movie star in Carey. She has the drive, the ambition ... and the production company.