Whitney
Houston, who reigned as pop music's queen until her majestic voice and regal
image were ravaged by drug use, has died. She was 48.
Publicist
Kristen Foster said Saturday that the singer had died, but the cause and the
location of her death were unclear.
At her peak
in the 1980s and `90s, Houston was the golden girl of the music industry and
one of the world's best-selling artists.
Her success
carried her beyond music to movies like "The Bodyguard."
But by the
end of her career, drug use took its toll as her record sales plummeted and her
voice became raspy and hoarse.
At her peak,
Whitney Houston was the golden girl of the music industry. From the middle
1980s to the late 1990s, she was one of the world's best-selling artists. She
wowed audiences with effortless, powerful, and peerless vocals that were rooted
in the black church but made palatable to the masses with a pop sheen.
Her success
carried her beyond music to movies, where she starred in hits like "The
Bodyguard" and "Waiting to Exhale."
She had the
he perfect voice, and the perfect image: a gorgeous singer who had sex appeal
but was never overtly sexual, who maintained perfect poise.
She
influenced a generation of younger singers, from Christina Aguilera to Mariah
Carey, who when she first came out sounded so much like Houston that many
thought it was Houston.
But by the
end of her career, Houston became a stunning cautionary tale of the toll of
drug use. Her album sales plummeted and the hits stopped coming; her once
serene image was shattered by a wild demeanor and bizarre public appearances.
She confessed to abusing cocaine, marijuana and pills, and her once pristine
voice became raspy and hoarse, unable to hit the high notes as she had during
her prime.
"The
biggest devil is me. I'm either my best friend or my worst enemy," Houston
told ABC's Diane Sawyer in an infamous 2002 interview with then-husband Brown
by her side.
It was a
tragic fall for a superstar who was one of the top-selling artists in pop music
history, with more than 55 million records sold in the United States alone.
She seemed
to be born into greatness. She was the daughter of gospel singer Cissy Houston,
the cousin of 1960s pop diva Dionne Warwick and the goddaughter of Aretha
Franklin.
Houston
first started singing in the church as a child. In her teens, she sang backup
for Chaka Khan, Jermaine Jackson and others, in addition to modeling. It was
around that time when music mogul Clive Davis first heard Houston perform.
"The
time that I first saw her singing in her mother's act in a club ... it was such
a stunning impact," Davis told "Good Morning America."
"To
hear this young girl breathe such fire into this song. I mean, it really sent
the proverbial tingles up my spine," he added.
Before long,
the rest of the country would feel it, too. Houston made her album debut in
1985 with "Whitney Houston," which sold millions and spawned hit
after hit. "Saving All My Love for You" brought her her first Grammy,
for best female pop vocal. "How Will I Know," "You Give Good
Love" and "The Greatest Love of All" also became hit singles.
Another
multiplatinum album, "Whitney," came out in 1987 and included hits
like "Where Do Broken Hearts Go" and "I Wanna Dance With
Somebody."
The New York
Times wrote that Houston "possesses one of her generation's most powerful
gospel-trained voices, but she eschews many of the churchier mannerisms of her
forerunners. She uses ornamental gospel phrasing only sparingly, and instead of
projecting an earthy, tearful vulnerability, communicates cool self-assurance
and strength, building pop ballads to majestic, sustained peaks of
intensity."
Her decision
not to follow the more soulful inflections of singers like Franklin drew
criticism by some who saw her as playing down her black roots to go pop and
reach white audiences. The criticism would become a constant refrain through
much of her career. She was even booed during the "Soul Train Awards"
in 1989.
"Sometimes
it gets down to that, you know?" she told Katie Couric in 1996.
"You're not black enough for them. I don't know. You're not R&B
enough. You're very pop. The white audience has taken you away from them."
Some saw her
1992 marriage to former New Edition member and soul crooner Bobby Brown as an
attempt to refute those critics. It seemed to be an odd union; she was seen as
pop's pure princess while he had a bad-boy image, and already had children of
his own. (The couple had a daughter, Bobbi Kristina, in 1993.) Over the years,
he would be arrested several times, on charges ranging from DUI to failure to
pay child support.
But Houston
said their true personalities were not as far apart as people may have
believed.
"When
you love, you love. I mean, do you stop loving somebody because you have
different images? You know, Bobby and I basically come from the same
place," she told Rolling Stone in 1993. "You see somebody, and you
deal with their image, that's their image. It's part of them, it's not the
whole picture. I am not always in a sequined gown. I am nobody's angel. I can
get down and dirty. I can get raunchy."
It would
take several years, however, for the public to see that side of Houston. Her
moving 1991 rendition of "The Star Spangled Banner" at the Super
Bowl, amid the first Gulf War, set a new standard and once again reaffirmed her
as America's sweetheart.
In 1992, she
became a star in the acting world with "The Bodyguard." Despite mixed
reviews, the story of a singer (Houston) guarded by a former Secret Service
agent (Kevin Costner) was an international success.
It also gave
her perhaps her most memorable hit: a searing, stunning rendition of Dolly
Parton's "I Will Always Love You," which sat atop the charts for
weeks. It was Grammy's record of the year and best female pop vocal, and the
"Bodyguard" soundtrack was named album of the year.
She returned
to the big screen in 1995-96 with "Waiting to Exhale" and "The
Preacher's Wife." Both spawned soundtrack albums, and another hit studio
album, "My Love Is Your Love," in 1998, brought her a Grammy for best
female R&B vocal for the cut "It's Not Right But It's Okay."
But during
these career and personal highs, Houston was using drugs. In an interview with
Oprah Winfrey in 2010, she said by the time "The Preacher's Wife" was
released, "(doing drugs) was an everyday thing. ... I would do my work,
but after I did my work, for a whole year or two, it was every day. ... I
wasn't happy by that point in time. I was losing myself."
In the
interview, Houston blamed her rocky marriage to Brown, which included a charge
of domestic abuse against Brown in 1993. They divorced in 2007.
Houston
would go to rehab twice before she would declare herself drug-free to Winfrey
in 2010. But in the interim, there were missed concert dates, a stop at an
airport due to drugs, and public meltdowns.
She was so
startlingly thin during a 2001 Michael Jackson tribute concert that rumors
spread she had died the next day. Her crude behavior and jittery appearance on
Brown's reality show, "Being Bobby Brown," was an example of her sad
decline. Her Sawyer interview, where she declared "crack is whack,"
was often parodied. She dropped out of the spotlight for a few years.
Houston
staged what seemed to be a successful comeback with the 2009 album "I Look
To You." The album debuted on the top of the charts, and would eventually
go platinum.
Things soon
fell apart. A concert to promote the album on "Good Morning America"
went awry as Houston's voice sounded ragged and off-key. She blamed an
interview with Winfrey for straining her voice.
A world tour
launched overseas, however, only confirmed suspicions that Houston had lost her
treasured gift, as she failed to hit notes and left many fans unimpressed; some
walked out. Canceled concert dates raised speculation that she may have been
abusing drugs, but she denied those claims and said she was in great shape,
blaming illness for cancellations.
THE BEST SONG-CHECK THE VIDEO
I LOOK TO YOU VIDEO
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