Sakira Information
Shakira Isabel Mebarak Ripoll (born February 2, 1977), known professionally as Shakira is a Colombian singer-songwriter, musician, record producer, dancer, and philanthropist who emerged as a musical prodigy in the music scene of Latin America in the early 1990. Born and raised in Barranquilla, Colombia, Shakira revealed many of her talents in school as a live performer, demonstrating her vocal ability with rock and roll, Latin and Middle Eastern influences with her own original twist on belly dancing. Shakira is a native Spanish speaker and also speaks fluent English, and Portuguese.
After commercial flops with local producers on her first two albums, and little-known outside Colombia, Shakira decided to produce her own brand of music. In 1995 she released Pies Descalzos, which brought her great fame in Latin America and Spain, and her 1998 album ¿Dónde Están los Ladrones? was a critical success. Since then she has gained many fans in semi-Hispanophone countries, and many non-Spanish-speaking countries, especially the United States. In 2001, and aided by heavy rotation of the music video, "Whenever, Wherever", she broke through into the English-speaking world with the release of Laundry Service, which sold over 13 million copies worldwide. Four years later, Shakira released two album projects called Fijación Oral Vol. 1 and Oral Fixation Vol. 2. Both reinforced her success, particularly with one of the most successful song in the 21st century to date, "Hips Don't Lie". From October-November 2009 Shakira released her latest album She Wolf worldwide.
Early life
Shakira means "thankful" in Arabic. It is the feminine form of the name Shakir. Her second name, Isabel, is also that of her paternal grandmother, meaning "my God is my oath", "my God's house" or "my God is abundance", and her name is a Spanish given name for Elizabeth. Her second surname name Ripoll is Catalan. She spent much of her youth in Barranquilla, a city located in northern Colombia. Shakira's business acumen is often attributed to a high IQ, which is reported in the entertainment press to be 140.
Shakira wrote her first poem, entitled "La Rosa De Cristal" ("The Crystal Rose") when she was only four years old. As she was growing up, she was fascinated watching her father writing stories on a typewriter, and asked for one as a Christmas gift. She got her wish at age seven and continued writing poetry. These poems eventually evolved into songs. At the age of two, an older half-brother was killed in a motorcycle accident and at the age of eight, Shakira wrote her first song entitled "Tus gafas oscuras" ("Your dark glasses") which was inspired by her father, who for years wore dark glasses, to hide his grief.
When Shakira was four, her father took her to a local Middle Eastern restaurant, where Shakira first heard the doumbek, a traditional drum used in Arabic music and which typically accompanied belly dancing. Before she knew it, Shakira was dancing on the table, as restaurant patrons responded by clapping enthusiastically. It was then that Shakira said she knew she wanted to be a performer. She enjoyed singing for schoolmates and teachers (and even the nuns) at her Catholic school, but in the second grade was rejected for the school choir because her vibrato was too strong. The music teacher told her that she sounded "like a goat".At school, she says she had been known as "the belly dancer girl", as she would demonstrate every Friday at school a number she had learned. "That's how I discovered my passion for live performance," she says.
Career
1990-1994
Shakira's debut album, Magia, was recorded with Sony Music in 1990 when she was only thirteen years old. The songs are a collection penned by her since she was 8, mixed pop-rock ballads and disco with electronic accompaniment, however it was hampered by a lack of recording and production cohesion. The album was released in 1991 and featured Magia and three other singles. Though it fared well on Colombian radio and gave the young Shakira much exposure, the album did not fare well commercially: only 1,200 copies were sold and the music video for Magia became first national pop video in Colombia. After the poor acclaim of Magia, Shakira's label urged her back into the studio to release a follow up with more hit songs, to give the album potential.
1995–1997
Shakira returned to recording in 1995 with Luis F. Ochoa, using musical influences from a number of countries and an Alanis Morissette-oriented persona which affected some of her next albums and made her third studio album, Pies Descalzos. Recording for the album began in February 1995, after the success of her single ¿Dónde Estás Corazón?. Sony gave Shakira $100,000 to produce the album since they predicted that the album would not sell past 100,000 copies. Starting with this album, Shakira began producing her own music, perfecting her vocals and most of all, creative control over her music. Highly influenced by American alternative market and British groups such as The Pretenders, the album was decently presented at small auditorium at La Castilian Theater in Bogotá on October 6, 1995. The tunes of the album are melodic, musically surprising and gritty, with intellectual lyrics and an electronic/acoustic blend that effectively broke the formulaic mold of Latin pop with an authentic sound that hadn’t been heard before.
1998–2000
Her fourth album: Where Are The Thieves? produced entirely by Shakira herself and Emilio Estefan, Jr. as the executive, was released on September 28, 1998. The album, inspired by an incident in an airport in which a suitcase full of her written lyrics was stolen, became a bigger hit than Pies Descalsos.On the day of its official release in Miami the album sold to 300,000 copies in one day. Allmusic and Rolling Stone gave to the album 4.5/5 stars and Donde Estan Los Ladrones has reached #131 peak position in the U.S. Billboard 200 and charting 11 weeks top spot on the Billboard Top Latin Albums. It sold over 1,500,000 copies in the U.S. alone, making it one of the best selling Spanish albums in the U.S.
2001–2004
"Whenever, Wherever" was released as the first and lead single from Shakira's first English album in October 2001. The song takes heavy influence from Andean music, including the charango and panpipes in its instrumentation. The track was produced by Shakira, and it was an international success. See exclusive music video of Wherever Wherever.
2005-2007
Shakira stayed out of the spotlight for over two years. Many possible dates of release were delayed and she announced the Oral Fixation project in early 2005 with Rick Rubin as the executive producer. Fijación Oral Vol. 1, the first album of the project, was released on June 3, 2005 in Ireland, on June 6, 2005 in Europe, and on June 7, 2005 in North America, Latin America and Australia. The lead single from the album, "La Tortura" (U.S. #23), which features the Spanish balladeer Alejandro Sanz, was released as a single in April and achieved large-scale success in different radio and chart formats. It spent a record of twenty-five weeks at number one on the Billboard Hot Latin Tracks chart. Shakira became the first artist to perform a Spanish language song at the MTV Video Music Awards.
2009-present: She Wolf and forthcoming Bilingual album
During an online chat with her fans in El Heraldo, she revealed that she was going to start writing her New Album in February 2008. Furthermore, at the CD release party for Shakira's singer-songwriter cousin Isa Mebarak in Colombia, Shakira's father William Mebarak stated that Shakira is currently at work beginning to write and produce new songs for her upcoming album. This is being done in "her own studio", which many fans thought to mean the studio at her home in the Bahamas. Shakira recorded 2005's Fijación Oral Vol. 1 and Oral Fixation Vol. 2 there, as well.After two weeks in London, Shakira flew to Colombia for a peace concert in Leticia (at the three way border of Colombia, Peru and Brazil) with Carlos Vives. Followed by hundreds of thousands of fellow Colombians, Shakira was calling for the release of hostages being held by rebels in Colombia and an end to similar kidnappings in the region. Afterward, it was reported by Noticias Caracol in Colombia that Shakira returned to her home studio in the Bahamas and continued recording "a little something" with members of Vives' band.
Personal life
Shakira was raised Roman Catholic. Shakira currently lives in The Bahamas. In 2000, she started dating Antonio de la Rúa, the son of the then President of Argentina Fernando de la Rúa, a romance that made headline news throughout Latin America. In March 2001, he proposed to her. There have been many rumors regarding the couple over the years. In June 2007, Latin American media speculated that the couple had finally split up. On the previous days, Shakira and Antonio were seen in a restaurant in New York City, facing and denying the rumors one more time. Shakira's future mother-in-law Inés Pertiné claimed the wedding would take place in September 2007 in the mansion which Shakira owns in the Dominican Republic, but the wedding did not happen. She also said that Shakira has already ordered Argentine designer María Pryor to design her wedding dress. All this was denied by Shakira herself in Mexico.
Philanthropy and humanitarian work
In 1995, Shakira founded the Pies Descalzos Foundation. It is a Colombian charity with special schools for poor children all around Colombia. It was funded by Shakira and other international groups and individuals. The name of the foundation is taken from Shakira's third studio album called Pies Descalzos, released in 1995.
During her career, Shakira has performed at a large number of benefit concerts. In 2002 she sang at a Party in the Park concert fundraising for the Prince's Trust. That same year she performed at Divas Live which support VH1's Save the Music Foundation. On July 2, 2005 she performed her hits "Whenever, Wherever" and "La Tortura" on the Live 8 benefit concert at the Palace of Versailles, near Paris. On July 7, 2007, the singer opened the German leg of Live Earth in Hamburg. Her set included "Don't Bother", "Inevitable" and "Hips Don't Lie". Shakira also performed at the "Clinton Global Initiative", where she performed her hits "Underneath Your Clothes", "Inevitable" and "Hips Don't Lie". On May 17, 2008 Shakira and twenty other Latin American and Spanish artists performed in Buenos Aires and Mexico City to raise money for Shakira's Latin America in Solidarity Action "America Latina en Accion Solidaria" (ALAS Foundation) charity. This concert attracted 150,000 people in Buenos Aires. Although tickets were free, the demand exceeded the supply; some fans who were fortunate enough to secure free tickets resold them.
Style
Music and voice
Shakira is known to have adopted many genres, including folk, mainstream pop and rock. In an interview with Rolling Stone she said: "My music, I think, is a fusion of many different elements. And I'm always experimenting. So I try not to limit myself, or put myself in a category, or... be the architect of my own jail". Her earlier Spanish albums, including Pies Descalzos and ¿Dónde Están Los Ladrones? were a mix of folk music and Latin rock, while her cross-over English album, Laundry Service and her later albums were influenced by pop rock and pop Latino.Her 2009 album, She Wolf is more like electropop and dance music.
Dancing
Shakira is well known for her dancing in various music videos and in concert. Her moves are based on the art of Arabic belly dancing, a part of her Lebanese heritage: her father has a Lebanese background but was raised in Colombia. She often performs barefoot. Shakira says she learned this form of dance as a young teen to overcome her shyness. She also mentioned in a MTV interview that she learned how to belly dance by trying to flip a coin with her belly.The intense training has afforded her a fluidity in her body movement most seen in the videos to her hits "Ojos Así", "La Tortura", "Hips Don't Lie", Whenever, Wherever / Suerte, "Beautiful Liar" and She Wolf / Loba. She has had several belly dance choreographers, including award-winning Bellydance Superstar Boženka. As the MTV Making the Video for "La Tortura" reveals, she worked with Jamie King on the choreography, but ended up creating most of it herself.Acting
Shakira appeared in the Colombian telenovela El Oasis in 1995, playing the character of Luisa Maria. In December 2009, Shakira appeared as herself in the Ugly Betty episode "The Bahamas Triangle". In 2010, Shakira appeared as herself in an episode of Wizards of Waverly Place.
Records, achievements and trivia
According to BMI, Shakira is the highest-selling Colombian artist of all time, having sold more than 50 million albums worldwide. According to Nielsen Broadcast Data Systems, "Hips Don't Lie" was the most-played pop song in a single week in American radio history. It was played 9,637 times in one week. Shakira became the first artist in the history of the Billboard charts to earn the coveted number one spots on both the Top 40 Mainstream and Latin Chart in the same week doing so with "Hips Don't Lie".
Awards
Grammy Award for Best Latin Pop Album
2001
for Shakira MTV Unplugged
Grammy Award for Best Latin Rock/Alternative Album
2006
for Fijación Oral Vol. 1
Latin Grammy Award for Record of the Year
2006
for La Tortura
Latin Grammy Award for Song of the Year
2006
for La Tortura
Latin Grammy Award for Album of the Year
2006
for Fijación Oral Vol. 1
