BIO SHAKIRA

Shakira Isabel Mebarak Ripoll (pronounced [(t)ʃaˈkiɾa isaˈβel meβaˈɾak riˈpol]; English: /ʃəˈkiːrə/; born 2 February 1977)[4] is a Colombian singer, songwriter, and dancer. Born and raised in Barranquilla, she began performing in school, demonstrating Latin American, Arabic, and rock and roll influences and belly dancing abilities. Shakira's first studio albums, Magia and Peligro, failed to attain commercial success in the 1990s; however, she rose to prominence in Latin America with her major-label debut, Pies Descalzos (1996), and her fourth album, Dónde Están los Ladrones? (1998). As of 2001, before releasing her best seller Laundry Service, she has sold over 10 million albums alone in Latin America.[5]

Born
Shakira Isabel Mebarak Ripoll
2 February 1977 (age 41)
Barranquilla, Atlántico, Colombia
Residence
Barcelona, Spain
Bonds Cay, The Bahamas[1]
Occupation
Singer songwriter dancer
Years active
1988–present
Partner(s)
Antonio de la Rúa (2000–2010)
Gerard Piqué (2011–present)
Children
2
Musical career
Genres
Pop Latin pop rock en español dance folk urban
Instruments
Vocals guitar drums percussion harmonica[2]
Labels
Columbia Epic Live Nation RCA Sony Music Latin Roc Nation[3]
Website
shakira.com

Shakira entered the English-language market with her fifth album, Laundry Service. Its lead single, "Whenever, Wherever", became one of the most successful singles of 2002. Her success was solidified with her sixth and seventh albums Fijación Oral, Volumen Uno and Oral Fixation, Volume Two (2005), the latter of which spawned the best selling single of the 2000s,[6] one of the best-selling songs of the 21st century, "Hips Don't Lie", selling over 13 million only counting downloads (not including any other forms of digital sales, streams and physical copies).[7] Shakira's eighth and ninth albums, She Wolf (2009) and Sale el Sol (2010), received critical praise. Her official song for the 2010 FIFA World Cup, "Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)", became the biggest-selling World Cup song of all time with 10 million downloads.[8][7] With over 1.7 billion views, it is one of the most viewed music videos on YouTube. She has four of the twenty top-selling hits of the last decade (2000 - 2009), more than any other artist.[9] Shakira served as a coach on the fourth and sixth seasons of the American version of The Voice in 2013 and 2014, respectively. Her tenth album, Shakira (2014), is preceded by its lead single, "Can't Remember to Forget You".

Shakira has received numerous awards, including 5 MTV Video Music Awards, 3 Grammy Awards, 12 Latin Grammy Awards, 7 Billboard Music Awards, 33 Billboard Latin Music Awards and has been Golden Globe-nominated. She has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and sold over 125 million records worldwide as of 2012[10][11][12] (over 70 million albums sold) [13][14] with an estimated over 32.7 million record sales in the United States (as of 2018),[15] [16] making her the best selling South American singer and one of the best selling artists of all time. She carries out well-known philanthropic activities through charity work most notably through her Pies Descalzos Foundation. In 2011, she was appointed by U.S. President Barack Obama to the President’s Advisory Commission on Educational Excellence for Hispanics – a four-person group that advises the president and Education Secretary.[17][18] From 2012 to 2015, she was listed among world's top 100 most powerful women in the world by Forbes.[19][20][21][22] In 2017, she was the only artist listed as one of the world's greatest leaders by Fortune, ranked at 27th.[23]

Early life
Born on 2 February 1977 in Barranquilla, Colombia, she is the only child of William Mebarak Chadid and Nidia Ripoll Torrado. Her paternal grandparents emigrated from Lebanon to New York City, where her father was born.[24][25][26][27] Her father then emigrated to Colombia at age 5. The name Shakira is Arabic ([شَاكِرَة šākirah] error: {{lang}}: text has italic markup (help)), from which language it translates as "grateful". It is the feminine form of the name Shakir ([شَاكِر šākir] error: {{lang}}: text has italic markup (help)). From her mother, she has Spanish (Catalan and Castilian)[28][29] and Italian[30] ancestry. She was raised Catholic and attended Catholic schools.[31] She has eight older half-siblings from her father's previous marriage.[32] Shakira spent much of her youth in Barranquilla, a city located on the northern Caribbean coast of Colombia, and wrote her first poem, titled "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 that typewriter at the age of seven, and has continued writing poetry since then. These poems eventually evolved into songs. When Shakira was two years old, an older half-brother was killed in a motorcycle accident; six years later, at the age of eight, Shakira wrote her first song, titled "Tus gafas oscuras/Your dark glasses", which was inspired by her father, who for years wore dark glasses to hide his grief.[33]