George Michael ~ (born Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou, 25 June 1963) is an English musician, singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and record producer. Michael rose to superstardom during the 1980s and 1990s with his style of post-disco dance-pop.He has also been characterized as a blue-eyed soul singer, although his material draws more from middle-of-the-road pop than soul music. As one of the worlds best-selling music artists, Michael has sold more than 100 million records worldwide as of 2010. His 1987 debut solo album, Faith, has sold more than 20 million copies worldwide and made several records and achievements in the United States. Michael has garnered seven number one singles in the UK and eight number one hits on the Billboard Hot 100 in the US. In 2008, Billboard magazine ranked Michael the 40th most successful artist on the Billboard Hot 100 Top All-Time Artists list. Michael has won numerous music awards throughout his 30-year career, including three Brit Awards—winning Best British Male twice, four MTV Video Music Awards, four Ivor Novello Awards, three American Music Awards, and two Grammy Awards from eight nominations. In 2004, the Radio Academy named Michael as the most played artist on British radio between the period of 1984–2004. The documentary A Different Story was released in 2005; it covered his personal life and professional career. In 2006, George Michael announced his first tour in 15 years, the worldwide 25 Live tour, spanning three individual tours over the course of three years (2006, 2007 and 2008). 1981–1986: Wham! Michael first found success after forming the duo Wham! with Andrew Ridgeley in 1981. The bands first album Fantastic reached no. 1 in the UK in 1983 and produced a series of top 10 singles including Young Guns, Wham Rap! and Club Tropicana. Their second album, Make It Big reached No. 1 on the charts in the US. Singles from that album included Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go, Freedom, Everything She Wants, and Careless Whisper, the latter of which was Michaels first solo effort as a single. Michael sang on the original Band Aid recording of Do They Know Its Christmas? and donated the profits from Last Christmas/Everything She Wants to charity. In addition, he contributed background vocals to David Cassidys 1985 hit The Last Kiss, as well as Elton Johns 1985 successes Nikita and Wrap Her Up. Michael cited Cassidy as a major career influence and interviewed Cassidy for David Litchfields Ritz Newspaper. Wham!s tour of China in April 1985, the first visit to China by a Western popular music act, generated enormous worldwide media coverage, much of it centred on Michael. The tour was documented by film director Lindsay Anderson and producer Martin Lewis in their film Foreign Skies: Wham! In China. With the success of Michaels solo singles, Careless Whisper (1984) and A Different Corner (1986), rumours of an impending break up of Wham! intensified. The duo officially separated during the summer of 1986, after releasing a farewell single, The Edge of Heaven and a singles compilation, The Final, plus a sell-out concert at Wembley Stadium that included the world premiere of the China film. The Wham! partnership ended officially with the commercially successful single The Edge of Heaven, which reached no.1 on the UK chart in June 1986 Solo career The beginning of his solo career, during early 1987, was a duet with Aretha Franklin. I Knew You Were Waiting was a one-off project that helped Michael achieve an ambition by singing with one of his favourite artists, and it scored number one on both the UK Singles Chart and the Billboard Hot 100 upon its release. For Michael, it became his third consecutive solo number one in the UK from three releases, after 1984s Careless Whisper (though the single was actually from the Wham! album Make It Big) and 1986s A Different Corner. The single was also the first Michael had recorded as a solo artist which he had not written himself. The co-writer, Simon Climie, was unknown at the time, although he would have success as a performer with the band Climie Fisher in 1988. Michael and Aretha Franklin won a Grammy Award in 1988 for Best R&B Performance – Duo or Group with Vocal for the song. -wikipedia ~ ♥ Admin GingerSweet ♥ ~
Posted on: Sun, 16 Mar 2014 05:15:56 +0000
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