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 Alicia Augello Cook (born January 25, 1981) better known by her stage name Alicia Keys is an American recording artist, musician actress and Humanitarian Ambassador. She was raised by a single mother in Manhattan area in New York. Alicia Keys had learned to play classical music on the piano at age seven. She attended professional performing arts school and graduated at 16 as Valedictorian. She went to Columbia University for a while and left to pursue her music career.Keys was strongly influenced by music from all different generations and disciplines from Nina Simone, Donny Hathaway, Marvin Gay and Stevie Wonder to the classical compositions of Frederic Chopin, Eric Satie and Leontyne Price, not to mention the trendsetters such as Tupac Shakur, The Notorious BIG, Jay-Z and the Wu- Tang clan. Discovered by manager Jeff Robinson at a Harlem PAC when she was 14, Keys road to stardom was not easy. She has paid her dues and forged an incredible musical hybrid of soul, hip-hop and classical. This medley resulted in her five time Grammy winning 2001 in her inaugural release, Songs in A Minor. Minor sold more than 235,000 copies in its first week and later sales exceeded 10 million units worldwide. Key has a formidable team which comprises her manager, Robinson, President of MBK Entertainment, producer Kerry BMG Label Group have been an integral part of her music success and yet, Keys says, "They encourage me to be who I am creatively." After numerous tours all over the world, Keys produced her second album, The Diary of Alicia Keys in 2003 which sold over 8 million copies. This album awarded her an additional four Grammy Awards in 2005. Later that year, she released her first live album Unplugged, which debuted at number one in the US. She became the first female to have an MTV Unplugged number one and the highest since Nirvana in 1994. |
