Rihanna

Rihanna was born on February 20th, 1988 in a Barbados County known as St.Micheals. She led a normal island girl life going to a Combermere, a top sixth form school which is similar to a Technical School in the US. Her life defining moment came when one of her friends introduced her to Evan Rodgers, a producer from New York who was vacationing in Barbados. Rodgers arranged her to go to New York and meet the CEO of Def Jam records, Jay-Z. He heard her sing and knew that she had what it takes to make it big. Jay-Z was quoted as saying “It took me just two minutes to see she was a star”. Rihanna was only 16 when she was signed with Def Jam for her debut album, “Music of the Sun”.

Rihanna’s musical inspirations include Alicia Keys, Beyonce Knowles and Mariah Carey. She was ranked at #8 on the Maxim magazine Hot 100 of 2007 list. Her latest album, “Good Girl Gone Bad” debuted at No: 2 on the Billboard Top 200 album chart. The first single” Umbrella” stayed on the #1 spot for 10 consecutive weeks in the UK. It features songs produced by Timbaland, cameos by Jay-Z and a track called “Rehab” which was written by Justin Timberlake. Rihanna swept clean the 2007 MTV Video Music awards, taking home the evening’s two most special trophies, “Video of the Year” and Monster Single of the Year for her smash hit single “Umbrella”.