Alicia Keys came onto the scene offering something other R&B artists didn’t have: musical talent besides singing. Keys plays the piano and many other instruments, and from the beginning, she sounded strikingly different from others in the genre, but there was something timeless about her sound that brought in both fans looking for an edgy sound and fans who love classic R&B. She was born Alicia Aguello-Cook in 1981 in Manhattan, New York in the neighborhood of Harlem. Keys is biracial with an Irish-Italian mother and a Jamaican father. She started out acting at a young age and took up piano at the age of 7. She attended the prestigious Professional Performing Arts School in Manhattan and graduated as the valedictorian at 16 years old. She began attending Columbia University on a scholarship but decided to drop out to pursue her career in music. She signed with a division of Columbia records and took the stage name Alicia Keys. She had a song on the Men in Black soundtrack but later had her contract terminated. Next, she signed with J Records, the company formed by Clive Davis. He worked hard to promote her and went as far as getting her on “Oprah.” She dropped her first album, Songs in A Minor, in June 2001 and sold 50,000 copies the first day. Her singles like “Fallin’,” “A Woman’s Worth” and “Girlfriend” were incredibly well received, and the young star nabbed five Gammy Awards for her efforts. The followed it up with the release of The Diary of Alicia Keys in 2003. Her second album gave her more top singles like “You Don’t Know My Name” and “If I Ain’t Got You.” She won another four Grammys for The Diary of Alicia Keys. Keys then released her Unplugged album in 2005. It included arrangements of hit songs and guest performers like Adam Levine of Maroon 5 and Mos Def. She released As I Am in 2007 and rocketed to the top of the charts again with the single “No One.” Keys also tried her hand at acting with spots in the movies Smokin’ Aces and The Nanny Diaries and also a micro-series on MTV, “Fresh Takes.” As a philanthropist, Keys works with Keep a Child Alive, Frum tha Ground Up and others. Keep a Child Alive works with AIDS patients in Africa and gives them medicine, and Frum tha Ground Up works to push American youth toward success. Through these philanthropies and her songs, Alicia Keys shows she is both a talented and compassionate artist who continues to shine.
