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Madonna
Madonna at the premiere of I Am Because We Are in 2008.
Background information
Birth name Madonna Louise Ciccone
Also known as Madonna Ciccone, Madonna Louise Veronica Ciccone
Born August 16, 1958 (1958-08-16) (age 51)
Bay City, Michigan,
United States
Genres Pop, rock, dance, electronic
Occupations Singer, songwriter, record producer, dancer, actress, film producer, film director, fashion designer, author, entrepreneur
Instruments Vocals, guitar, percussion, drums Years active 1979–present Labels Sire (1982–1995)
Maverick (1992–2004)
Warner Bros. (1982–2009)
Live Nation Artists (2008–present)
Associated acts Breakfast Club, Emmy
Website
www.madonna.com Madonna (born Madonna Louise Ciccone; August 16, 1958) is an American recording artist, actress and entrepreneur.
Born in Bay City, Michigan, and raised in Rochester Hills, Michigan, she moved to New York City in 1977, for a career in modern dance. After performing as a member of the pop musical groups Breakfast Club and Emmy, she released her self-titled debut album, Madonna, in 1983 on Sire Records.A series of hit singles from her next studio albums, Like a Virgin (1984) and True Blue (1986), gained her global recognition. They established her as a pop icon, for pushing the boundaries of lyrical content in mainstream popular music and imagery in her music videos, which became a fixture on MTV. Her recognition was augmented by the film Desperately Seeking Susan (1985) which widely became seen as a Madonna vehicle, despite her not playing the lead. Expanding on the use of religious imagery with Like a Prayer (1989), Madonna received positive critical reception for her diverse musical productions, while at the same time was criticised by religious conservatives and the Vatican. In 1992, Madonna founded the Maverick corporation, a joint venture between herself and Time Warner. The same year, she expanded the use of sexually explicit material in her work, beginning with the release of the studio album Erotica, followed by the publishing of the coffee table book Sex, and starring in the erotic thriller Body of Evidence, all of which received negative responses from conservatives and liberals alike.
In 1996, Madonna played the starring role in the film Evita, for which she won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in Motion Picture Musical or Comedy. Madonna's seventh studio album, Ray of Light (1998), became one of her most critically acclaimed, recognized for its lyrical depth. During the 2000s, Madonna released four studio albums – namely Music (2000), American Life (2003), Confessions on a Dance Floor (2005) and Hard Candy (2008) – all of which debuted at number one on the Billboard 200. Departing from Warner Bros. Records, Madonna signed an unprecedented $120 million dollar contract with Live Nation in 2008.
According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, Madonna has sold more than 200 million albums worldwide.[1] She is ranked by the Recording Industry Association of America as the best-selling female rock artist of the 20th century, and the second top-selling female artist in the United States, with 64 million certified albums.[2][3] Guinness World Records listed her as the world's most successful female recording artist of all time. In 2008, Billboard magazine ranked Madonna at number two, behind only The Beatles, on the "Billboard Hot 100 All-Time Top Artists", making her the most successful solo artist in the history of the chart. She was also inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in the same year. Considered to be one of the most influential women in contemporary music, Madonna has been known for continually reinventing both her music and image, and for retaining a standard of autonomy within the recording industry. She is recognized as an influence among numerous music artists.
Contents [hide]
1 Biography
1.1 1958–81: Early life and beginnings
1.2 1982–85: Madonna, Like a Virgin and marriage to Sean Penn
1.3 1986–91: True Blue, Like a Prayer and the Blond Ambition Tour
1.4 1992–96: Maverick, Sex, Erotica, Bedtime Stories and Evita
1.5 1997–2002: Ray of Light, Music and Drowned World Tour
1.6 2003–06: American Life, Confessions on a Dance Floor and adoption case
1.7 2007–09: Live Nation, Hard Candy and the Sticky & Sweet Tour
1.8 2010–present: Upcoming projects
2 Musical style
2.1 Influences
2.2 Music videos and performances
3 Legacy
4 Discography
5 Other works
6 See also
7 Notes
8 References
9 Further reading
10 External links
Biography
1958–81: Early life and beginnings
Madonna was born in Bay City, Michigan, at 7:05 AM on August 16, 1958, to
Madonna Louise (née Fortin), who was of French Canadian descent, and
Silvio Ciccone, who was a first-generation Italian American working as a design engineer for Chrysler and General Motors, originating from Pacentro, Abruzzo, Italy. Madonna was nicknamed "Little Nonni", to distinguish her from her mother.[4][5] She is the third of six children;
her siblings are Martin, Anthony, Paula, Christopher, and Melanie.[6] Madonna was raised in the Detroit suburbs of Pontiac and Avon Township (now Rochester Hills). Her mother died of breast cancer at age 30 on December 1, 1963.[6] Then her father married the family's housekeeper, Joan Gustafson, and they had two children; Jennifer and Mario Ciccone. Madonna commented on her father's second marriage: "I didn't accept my stepmother when I was growing up [...] In retrospect, I think I was really hard on her."[7]
She attended St. Frederick's and St. Andrew's Elementary Schools, and after that West Middle School. There she became known for her high GPA - and for her "unusual" behavior, particularly a kind of an underwear fetish.[8] Madonna performed cartwheels and handstands in the hallways between classes, dangled by her knees from the monkey bars during recess, and pulled her skirt up during class, so that all the boys could see her briefs.[8]Later, she went to Rochester Adams High School, becoming a straight-A student and a member of the cheerleading squad.[6] Madonna received a dance scholarship to the University of Michigan after graduating from high school.[9] She wanted to take ballet lessons and convinced her father to allow her to take the classes.[10] Her ballet teacher persuaded her to pursue a career in dance, so she left the college at the end of 1977, and relocated to New York City.[11][12] Madonna had little money at that time and hence lived in squalor, working as a waitress in Dunkin' Donuts and
with modern dance troupes.[13] Of her move to New York, Madonna said, "It was the first time I'd ever taken a plane, the first time I'd ever gotten a taxi cab. I came here with $ 35 in my pocket. It was the bravest thing I'd ever done."[14] While performing as a dancer for
the French disco artist Patrick Hernandez on his 1979 world tour,[8] Madonna became romantically involved with the musician Dan Gilroy, with whom she later formed her first rock band, the Breakfast Club, in New York.[15][7] She sang and played drums and guitar for the band, but soon departed from them and formed another band called Emmy in 1980, with drummer and former boyfriend Stephen Bray. Together they wrote and produced dance-pop songs, that brought her to the attention of DJ and record producer Mark Kamins. He was impressed by Madonna's demo recordings, so he brought her to the attention of Sire Records founder Seymour Stein.[16][17]
1982–85: Madonna, Like a Virgin and marriage to Sean Penn
A Barbie doll wearing a wedding dress, similar to the one that Madonna wore at the 1984 MTV Video Music Awards and The Virgin Tour.Madonna signed a singles deal with Sire Records, a label belonging to Warner Bros. Records.[18]
Her debut single, "Everybody", was released on April 24, 1982, and became a dance hit.[19] Her debut album, Madonna, was primarily produced by Reggie Lucas.[20] At the same time, she became involved with artist Jean-Michel Basquiat and lived with him for a time in his loft.[21] Soon after, she left the artist because of his drug use and late hours, moving in with musician John "Jellybean" Benitez to continue developing the album.[16] After its release, it peaked at number eight on the Billboard 200, and produced the top-ten singles, "Borderline" and "Lucky Star".[22][23]
Slowly, Madonna's look and manner of dress, her performances and music videos, became influential among young girls and women. Mainly created by stylist and jewellery designer Maripol, Madonna's style of dress – defined by lace tops, skirts over capri pants, fishnet stockings,
jewelry bearing the Christian cross, multiple bracelets, and bleached hair – became a female fashion trend of the 1980s.[24] Madonna eventually achieved global fame after the release of her sophomore album,
Like a Virgin (1984). It topped the charts in several countries and became her first number-one album on the Billboard 200.[22][25] The title track "Like a Virgin" reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for six consecutive weeks.[23] Madonna performed the song at the first MTV Video Music Awards, where she appeared on stage atop a giant wedding cake dressed in a wedding dress, adorned with
the infamous "Boy Toy" belt buckle, and veil. To date, the performance is noted as one of the iconic and biggest performance in MTV history.[26] Like a Virgin was certified diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America and sold more than 21 million copies worldwide.[27][28] The National Association of Recording Merchandisers and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame listed the album as one of the Definitive 200 Albums of All Time.[29]
The next year, Madonna entered mainstream films, beginning with a brief appearance as a club singer in
Vision Quest, a romantic drama film. Its soundtrack contained her second US number-one single, "Crazy for You".[30] She also appeared in the comedy Desperately Seeking Susan (1985), a film which introduced the song
"Into the Groove", her first number-one single in the United Kingdom.[31] Although not the lead actress for the film, her profile was such that the movie widely became seen (and marketed) as a Madonna vehicle.[32] The film received a nomination for a César Award for Best Foreign Film, and The New York Times film critic Vincent Canby, named it as one of the ten best films of 1985, with the lead actress Rosanna Arquette, receiving a supporting actress BAFTA for her role.[33] While filming the music video for the second single from Like a Virgin, titled "Material Girl", Madonna started dating actor Sean Penn and married him on her twenty-seventh birthday that year.[34]
Madonna embarked on her first concert tour in North America, titled The Virgin Tour, with the Beastie Boys as opening acts.[35] In July 1985, Penthouse and Playboy magazines published a number of nude photos of Madonna, taken in New York in 1978. Madonna had posed for the photographs as she was in need of money.[36] But because she had signed the appropriate release forms, she could not take legal action to block them.[36] The publication of the photos caused media uproar, but Madonna remained defiant and unapologetic; she was paid as little as $25 a session. The photographs were ultimately sold for up to $100,000.[36] She referenced this incident at the outdoor Live Aid charity concert and stated that she would not take her jacket off because "they [media] might hold it against me ten years from now."[37][38]
1986–91: True Blue,
Like a Prayer and the Blond Ambition Tour