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Ciara Princess Harris (born October 25 1985) is a Grammy Award-winning American R&B and singer, songwriter, actress, and dancer.

Early Life

Ciara was born in Austin, Texas, on October 25, 1985. Ciara grew up in army bases in Germany, New York, California, Arizona and Nevada, since her father was in the United States Army. When her mother figured out that she wanted to pursue a career in music is when she picked her up from daycare, and sung every song that was played on the radio. Ciara moved to Atlanta when she was 8 years old. One day, when she was 14, she came home from school and told her mom that she really wanted to be a singer, and her mom said, "Ciara, I don't know if this is what you really want."

She has said that it was seeing a televised performance by Destiny's Child that inspired her to pursue a career in music. In her early teens she formed the goal to become a professional singer. She once was a cheerleader for her high school team, until she quit. She then joined a girl group called "Hearsay", worked on her songwriting, eventually left the group, got a publishing deal, and found a "musical soulmate" when she met producer Jazze Pha.

Career

Ciara's debut single, Goodies, became a hit, reaching the top of the United States pop, hip-hop and R&B charts, and also charting in the United Kingdom (in January 2005, also reaching number one), Australia, Germany, Sweden, and New Zealand. With help from Jazze Pha, Sean Garrett, and Lil Jon, Ciara released her debut album, Goodies on September 28, 2004. It entered the Billboard 200 chart at #3, and sold over three million copies in the USA alone.

The second single, "1, 2 Step", featuring Missy Elliott, reached the top five in the U.S., peaking at #2 in early 2005. The single was released in the U.K. on April 11 the same year, and reached #3, benefiting from the fact that it was the first week that downloads were incorporated into the singles chart. Ciara charted one place higher than she would have done if downloads had not been included in the chart formula; she would have instead swapped places with Elvis Presley's re-issue of "The Wonder of You".

In May 2005, Ciara's third single, "Oh" featuring Ludacris, reached #2 on the Hot 100 and #4 on the U.K. charts. In July of 2005 she released her DVD of all three of her music videos, the makings of two of them, commentaries of two of them, behind the scenes footage of her rehearsals for the Soul Train Awards, and multi-angle shots of Goodies, entitled The Videos & More.

Furthermore Ciara was featured on Missy Elliott's #3 hit "Lose Control", taken from the rapper's sixth album, The Cookbook. Because of this collaboration she can be considered a two-way artist, meaning she can both rap and sing equally well. In the fall of 2005, she was featured singing alongside past love interest, Bow Wow, on the second single from his third album Wanted entitled "Like You". The duet also reached a peak of #3. In the meantime her fourth single, "And I", was released and peaked at #96 which was relatively poor compared to the first three singles.

In the December of 2005 Ciara joined Gwen Stefani on her "Harajuku Lovers Tour", before going on tour with Bow Wow and Chris Brown for the "Holladay Jam" which stopped at cities like New York and Atlanta. On February 8, 2006 Ciara won her first Grammy for Best Short Form Music Video along with Missy Elliott. She also performed a duet with Maroon 5's Adam Levine during the show in tribute to the legendary R&B musician Sly Stone, a cover of Sly & the Family Stone's 1968 classic "Everyday People". Afterwards Ciara finished a MTV coming-of-age film, entitled All You've Got.

Ciara released a new single entitled Get Up in June of 2006. which will be featured on the soundtrack for the movie Step Up.

Discography

Albums

Singles

Year Song Album
2004 "Goodies" (featuring Petey Pablo) Goodies
2004 "1, 2 Step" (featuring Missy Elliott) Goodies
2005 "Oh" (featuring Ludacris) Goodies
2005 "And I" Goodies
2005 "Lose Control" (Missy Elliot featuring Ciara) The Cookbook
2005 "Like You" (Bow Wow featuring Ciara) Wanted
2006 "So What" (Field Mob featuring Ciara) Light Poles and Pine Trees
2006 "Get Up" (featuring Chamillionaire) Step Up Soundtrack

Album appearances

DVDs and videos

Videography

Awards

Filmography

External links

1985 births | African-American singers | American dance musicians | American female singers | American pop singers | American rhythm and blues singers | People from Austin, Texas | Grammy Award winners | Living people | People from Texas | Rhythmic Top 40 acts

Ciara | Ciara | Ciara | Ciara | Ciara | Ciara | Ciara | Ciara | Ciara | Ciara

 

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "Ciara".

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