June 23, 2009. Copyright 2009, Graphic News. All rights reserved

Grammy-award winning R&B artist Beyoncé
By Susan Shepherd

LONDON, June 23, Graphic News:  She was the lead singer with the most successful girl-band the music world has yet seen. Her solo career has produced albums such as Dangerously In Love, which have gone platinum several times over. And her association with the rap star Shawn Carter -- known as Jay-Z -- won her a listing as one half of a Power Couple in Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2006.  When Houston-born Beyoncé Giselle Knowles married fellow musician Carter in New York last year, the pair had the date tattooed onto their wedding fingers. The bride later revealed a ring said to have cost $5 million. 

A singer and performer from the age of seven, Beyoncé’s first influence was her father, Mathew. He gave up his job to manage his daughter’s career when her exceptional talent became obvious in her early teens. In the year she turned 16, her girl group, by now known as Destiny’s Child and including her cousin, Kelly Rowland, signed to Columbia Records. The four albums they produced at the end of the 1990s achieved such staggering sales that Destiny’s Child is now officially recognised as the best-selling female group of all time. By 2000, the band -- now a trio, with Beyonce at its centre -- had opened for Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera. Their single, Independent Woman Part 1, was the soundtrack to the film Charlie’s Angels and became their longest-runnng number one hit. 

Like Diana Ross before her, Beyonce left the group to pursue a solo career in 2001. The group reunited three years later for a final, sell-out world tour.  She has also acted in a number of films, notably in Dreamgirls and the Austin Powers spoof Goldmember, where she played Foxxy Cleopatra.
/ENDS