ctress,
singer. Born Aaliyah Dana Haughton, on January 16,
1979, in Brooklyn, New York. Raised in Detroit,
Michigan, the young singer competed unsuccessfully
on the television program Star Search at age
11. Later that same year, she performed with R&B
legend Gladys Knight, the former wife of her uncle
and manager, Barry Hankerson, at a five-night stand
in Las Vegas.
In 1994, at the age of 15, Aaliyah catapulted
onto the R&B charts herself with her debut album,
Age Ain’t Nothing But a Number. Produced by the
successful singer R. (Robert) Kelly, the album
quickly sold a million copies and eventually earned
platinum status based largely on the success of two
hit singles, “Back and Forth” and “At Your Best (You
Are Love).” Later that year, tabloid reports
surfaced claiming that the sultry teen singer had
married the 27-year-old Kelly, but Aaliyah denied
the union and the marriage was reportedly annulled.
While a student in the dance program at Detroit
High School for the Fine and Performing Arts (she
graduated in 1997), Aaliyah released her sophomore
album, One in a Million (1996). Helmed by the
well-known pop producer Timbaland (Tim Mosely) and
featuring rap performer Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliott,
One in a Million portrayed the 17-year-old
singer as a sultry hip-hop chanteuse with a
self-confidence well beyond her years. The album
garnered favorable reviews and sold two million
copies.
Aaliyah gained even more recognition in 1997 when
she recorded “Journey to the Past,” the Academy
Award-nominated theme song to the animated feature
Anastasia. She also performed the song for
the Oscar telecast in 1998. Her next soundtrack
effort, “Are You That Somebody?" for 1998’s Dr.
Dolittle, starring Eddie Murphy, went to No. 1
on the R&B charts, was a pop crossover hit, and
earned Aaliyah her first Grammy Award nomination.
In 2000, Aaliyah made her acting debut in the
surprise action hit Romeo Must Die, starring
opposite martial arts star Jet Li in a Romeo and
Juliet-inspired story set in modern-day Los
Angeles. She was also an executive producer of the
movie’s soundtrack and performed the hit single “Try
Again,” which netted her a second Grammy nomination
as well as two MTV Music Video Awards for Best
Female Video and Best Video From a Film.
Her third album, Aaliyah, was released in
July 2001 and reached No. 2 on the Billboard
album chart. Also in 2001, she played the title role
in Queen of the Damned, based on the
bestselling novel by Anne Rice and set for release
in 2002. She scored a major casting coup when she
signed to appear in two upcoming sequels to the
blockbuster sci-fi thriller The Matrix,
starring Keanu Reeves and Laurence Fishburne.
Tragically, Aaliyah was killed on August 25,
2001, when a small Cessna passenger plane carrying
the singer and her video crew crashed and burst into
flames shortly after takeoff from Abaco Island in
the Bahamas, where they had just completed work on a
video. The plane was headed for Miami, Florida.
Aaliyah and seven other people, including the pilot,
were believed to have died instantly, while a ninth
passenger died later at a Bahamian hospital. Aaliyah
was 22 years old at the time of her death. She is
survived by her parents, Diane and Michael Haughton,
and an older brother, Rashaad.
