Fantasia Barrino

At 39 years old, Fantasia Barrino has this physical status:

Fantasia Monique Barrino-Taylor (born June 30, 1984), better known by her mononym Fantasia, is an American R&B singer, songwriter, actress, and writer.

She rose to fame as the winner of the third season of the reality television show American Idol in 2004.

Following her triumph, she debuted her debut single, "I Believe," which debuted at number one on the Billboard Hot 100.

She debuted Free Yourself, her debut album that went on to be named Platinum by the RIAA and garnered Barrino three Grammy nominations in 2006. She released Fantasia, her second album, which included the single "When I See U" which debuted on the Billboard Hot R&B/Hip Songs chart for eight weeks in 2006.

The RIAA has rated this album Gold and has received three Grammy nominations in 2008.

She then appeared in the Broadway musical The Color Purple, for which she received a 2007 Theatre World Award.

Back to Me, her third studio album, was released worldwide on August 24, 2010 and features the single "Bittersweet," which peaked in the top ten on the R&B charts.

The artist received the Grammy Award for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance.

Barrino has recorded 2,842,000 albums and 1,425,000 tracks in the United States as of February 2012.

VH1 ranked her 32nd out of the 100 Greatest Women in Music in 2012, according to a survey published by the New York Times in 2012. Barrino performed "Lose to Win" on American Idol on April 18, 2013. The performance, dubbed "dynamic, passionate, and powerful," received fervent expressions of appreciation from the show's current judges and a wild ovation from the live audience.

In addition, she has received rave reviews in the media for her work.

After Midnight, Barrino returned to Broadway in November 2013.

She was inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame on October 16, 2014. Patti LaBelle, Barrino's best friend, has dubbed her name "Baby Patti LaBelle."

Early life

Barrino was born in High Point, North Carolina, and raised with Diane and Joseph Barrino. At the age of five, she began performing. K-Ci & JoJo are her first cousins in R&B. The Barrino Brothers, her uncles, were a 1970s R&B band.

Despite the travels, she attended Andrews High School in High Point, North Carolina. She dropped out of high school after being embarrassed and threatened by a classmate. She became pregnant at 16, and her ex-boyfriend Brandel Shouse gave birth to a daughter on August 8, 2001.

Personal life

Barrino wrote a memoir in September 2005 that was dictated to a freelance writer called Life Is Not a Fairy Tale. She revealed herself to be a functionally illiterate in it. Barrino's father was sued for $10 million in 2006 after she said the book's unflattering allegations about him were inaccurate.

Barrino's 6,600-square-foot (610 m2) lakefront home in Charlotte's Glynmoor Lakes at Piper Glen neighborhood was in foreclosure and will be up for auction on December 9, 2008. Her 4,500-square-foot (420 m2) home, which is also in Piper Glen, is unaffected. The home was supposed to be auctioned in January 2009 by the Mecklenburg County Sheriff's Office after the corporation Broward Energy Partners, which had paid over $68,000 in 2006, said it was not completely repaid. The auction proceeds were intended to finish reimbursing the loan, on which Barrino had to pay $10,000. Barrino's lawyers and the lender signed a "elevent-hour agreement" at a stop-page, but the auction's terms were not disclosed.

Michael Clayton, a former NFL player who was playing for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at the time, was dated by her.

Barrino had a year-long friendship with Antwaun Cook, who was married, bringing up the issue of alienation of affection laws in North Carolina, according to a Mecklenburg County District Court filing in August 2010. Since Cook and his wife divorced, Barrino said the two began dating. A North Carolina judge ruled in Barrino's favour in December 2010, not June 2010, as Paula had predicted.

Barrino was hospitalized in Pineville, North Carolina, on August 9, 2010 due to an overdose of aspirin and an unidentified sleep aid.

In December 2011, she gave birth to a son.

Kendall Taylor, a businessman, was married on July 18, 2015.

Barrino said in an interview on The Breakfast Club radio show that women weren't to lead their families and that the reason so many women were single was because they're trying to be the man of a marriage, a job that should be shared by women, not to be the husband.

Barrino revealed in November 2020 that she was expecting her first child with husband Kendall Taylor. She gave birth to a daughter in May 2021.

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Career

Barrino's performance was a revival of the Porgy and Bess standard "Summertime" that left her in tears from "feeling the music" and receiving praise from the judges, and she was selected as one of AOL's top television moments in 2004.

Barrino's second appearance of the season, garnering the judges' praise; Simon Cowell remarked that she was the best contestant to ever compete in any competition, including the over seventy Idol champions crowned nationally and internationally since the show's first global incarnations. Over 6 million votes were cast to determine the winner on May 26, 2004, up from 24 million in 2003. Barrino gained 1.3 million votes over runner Diana DeGarmo. She was the youngest American Idol winner until May 23, 2007, when the 17-year-old Jordin Sparks claimed the title at age 19.

Barrino participated in the United States Tour with the other American Idol winners and appeared in the 2004 Christmas special, Kelly, Ruben, and Fantasia: Home for the Holidays as well.

Barrino's brother auditioned for the eighth season of American idol but didn't make it to the Hollywood round.

Barrino signed with 19 Entertainment and began working on her debut album after winning American Idol. In June 2004, she released her debut single, "I Believe," which debuted at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 for a month. Barrino became the first artist to achieve this feat with a first single on his debut in history. The single spent eleven weeks on the charts, the longest in a row for an American Idol contestant. "I Believe" the CD single went on to become the top-selling single in the United States, and the CRIA has since been awarded double platinum. She has also received three Billboard Music Awards for the single.

Barrino's debut studio album, Free Yourself, was released in November 2004. In its first week, it debuted at number eight on the Billboard 200, selling 240,000 copies. It has sold over two million copies around the world, and was awarded Platinum in the United States. The singles "Reality Is" and "Free Yourself" became R&B hits, peaking at number two and three on the Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop charts, while the notorious "Baby Mama"—which critics accused of romanticizing single motherhood — landed in the top ten. Barrino did much better on the Billboard Hot Adult R&B Airplay, where she was the first artist of any sort to hold top-two positions at the top of the top three charts, while "Truth Is" spent 14 weeks in the top ten, the first female debut on the top three. According to the December 13, 2005 issue of Billboard magazine, Barrino was named the number one artist of the Adult Urban Contemporary style for 2005.

Barrino made several television appearances to promote her album through the spring and winter of 2005. Aretha Franklin appeared in "Respect" on The Simpsons episode "A Star Is Torn" guest lectured, and guest star "All of Us" guest star Richard Coveney appeared as herself in a cameo role. On The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, she appeared three times as a musical guest. After winning the award for Outstanding Female Artist on March 25, 2005, Barrino attended the thirty-sixth NAACP Image Awards in honor of Illinois Senator Barack Obama. Barrino appeared on her first live band tour in May 2005, with soul singers Kem and Rashaan Patterson. She has also appeared at numerous music festivals, including the Saint Lucia Jazz Festival and the Reggae Sumfest in Jamaica. She received good reviews as the opening act on Kanye West's Touch the Sky Tour in October 2005.

Barrino's debut album was nominated for three Grammy Awards in 2006. Despite not winning any prizes, she appeared in a joint tribute to Sly and the Family Stone at the Grammy Award show, including Aerosmith, Joss Stone, John Legend, Maroon 5, and Ciara.

Barrino appeared in a Lifetime Television film based on her autobiography "Life Is Not a Fairy Tale" in August 2006. Debbie Allen produced the film, which premiered on the women's cable network on August 19, 2006. During its first weekend, the film attracted nineteen million viewers. The Fantasia Barrino Novel: Life is Not a Fairy Tale has also become Lifetime's second most viewed program of all time.

Barrino had several musical collaborations during the fall of 2006, including a remake of Faith Evans' "Endow Me" with Patti LaBelle and Yol' Mo, a sequel to Stevie Wonder's 1976 film "I Wish" with Patti LaBelle and Yolanda Adams, most notably her duet with Aretha Franklin, which was released in 2007 but later released in 2007.

On December 12, 2006, she launched Fantasia, her self-titled second attempt. Missy Elliott, Swizz Beatz, Babyface, Diane Warren, and others produced the single "Hood Boy" by Tone Mason, "When I See U" and "Only One U" and went on to become certified gold.

"When I See You" became her first single to debut on the Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs chart, remained at number one for eight weeks in a row. The single remained on the charts for more than a year and was ranked eighth on the Billboard Best of The 2000s R&B/Hip-Hop Songs.

Barrino appeared and appeared on American Idol in February 2007 and confirmed that she would appear in Celie in the Broadway musical The Color Purple, based on Alice Walker's Pulitzer Prize-winning 1982 book of the same name. The musical received a boost in pre-ticket sales in a week after appearing on American Idol and The Oprah Winfrey Show. The play was a success in the run-up to her first appearance on April 10, 2007, bringing in 6.5 million in pre-tickets.

Barrino's performance received rave reviews when she was playing the part. "There is some elemental quality to Barrino that is either greatness or something close to it," Clive Barnes, a New York Times columnist. Barrino was invited to appear at the 2007 Tony Awards in a salute to Atlanta's Alliance Theater, in which The Color Purple got off. Barrino was given the Theatre World Award and the Best Replacement Star Broadway.com Award in recognition of his outstanding stage debut and the Best Replacement Star Broadway.com Award. Barrino had been planned for a limited six-month engagement that had come to an end in October 2007, but she had her run postponed until January 6, 2008. Since Barrino's debut in 2005, the Color Purple box office saw a thirty-four-fold increase in revenues since being on the show, a third of the play's 100 million dollar income since its debut in 2005. Barrino appeared in nearly fifty shows in the show, prompting the designers to withhold tens of thousands of dollars in refunds. The New York Post announced that he did not show the producers. Barrino explained that the reason for her absences in The Color Purple was due to the appearance of a cyst on her vocal cords. She was ordered to have surgery right away, but later discovered she had a tumor in her vocal cords. The tumor has been completely eradicated after a successful surgery, and she is now healthy.

Barrino received two Grammy awards for her sophomore debut, Fantasia, and then began recording her third studio album in 2008. On the red carpet of the 2008 Grammy Awards, she said the new album would be a blending of the avenues she has explored musically, including American Idol and Broadway. She also revealed that she would be writing some of the album's songs and that she would work with Missy Elliott of The Underdogs and Midi Mafia, who produced one of her best hits, "When I See U."

The majority of Barrino's third studio album, Midi Mafia, was produced by Mafia. In addition, hip hop duo Rock City was confirmed to be composing for the new project. They had recorded four songs together at the time. She also performed with singer-producer Rich King, which resulted in two songs for her third release. Some of the project's many others include KP, Eric Hudson, and Raphael Saadiq. Barrino said that 75% of the album was finished by mid-2009 and that fans should have a new single by the fall of 2009, with the album set to be released in early 2010. Barrino's new album was postponed, and she wanted to do a large amount of it the "old fashioned way," bringing a live orchestra to record in the studio with her.

Barrino announced on March 5, 2008 that she had been cast by Oprah Winfrey as Celie in the film adaptation of The Color Purple, which was supposed to begin production after the release of her third album.

Barrino resigned from 19 Entertainment in June 2008, but 19 Recordings and J Records remained. She said that following the success of her third album, she wants to release a gospel album. In a Thanksgiving special on BET's Bobby Jones Gospel, she and her mother, Diane Barrino, appeared alongside her father in a Thanksgiving special. Barrino appeared on Jennifer Hudson's self-titled album on the track "I'm His Only Woman," which was nominated for a 2009 Grammy Award, but it did not win.

During its Washington, D.C., Atlanta, and Los Angeles stops, Barrino reprised Celie's role in The Color Purple's national tour.

Barrino appears in a World of Wonder reality show. Titled Fantasia for Real, it premiered on January 11, 2010 on VH1 to rave reviews and ratings. The show's first season ended in July 2010, with its second season debuting on September 19, 2010.

"Even Angels," a song from Barrino's third studio album and written by Heather Bright, was never released to radio. On February 3, 2010, she performed the song on The Oprah Winfrey Show. "Bittersweet," the album's first official single, was released on May 11, 2010, and it has since risen to number seven on the Hot R&B/Hip Songs chart, as well as number seventy-four on the Billboard Hot 100.

Back to Me, Barrino's third studio album, was released on August 24, 2010. Barrino cited Tina Turner, Queen and Aretha Franklin as influences, and she performed with a live band as a child of the Renaissance. The album has been promoted by appearances on Good Morning America and The Wendy Williams Show, among other things. Barrino also performed "America the Beautiful" at WWE WrestleMania XXVI on March 28, 2010. Barrino took the plunge in 2010 as the first solo concert tour on the back of Me Tour.

Barrino appeared on Charlie Wilson's album "Just Charlie" on his album "I Want to Be Your Man."

On episode 11 of RuPaul's Drag Race, she appeared as a guest judge alongside Wayne Brady in the summer of 2010.

Barrino received her first Grammy Award for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance on "Bittersweet" on February 13, 2011.

Barrino appeared in her first film role in 2011, playing Mahalia Jackson, the Queen of Gospel, in a biographical film based on the 1993 book Getting to Tell It: Mahalia Jackson, Queen of Gospel. The Mahalia Jackson estate had utterly supported the film, according to the Mahalia Jackson estate. Barrino will not receive not only the top salary of the venture but also a part of the film's box office earnings. With a release date of late 2012 and a premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, production was originally scheduled to begin in October 2011 in New Orleans and Chicago. Barrino had to cancel her scheduled appearance there due to medical issues necessing bed rest, according to the show's founders. Double Dutch Productions LLC, Mahalia's production company, released a statement saying it "extends apologizes to Barrino for his inaccurate, non-factual, and disparaging remarks of Ms. Barrino's fame, character, and image" after reports were reported that Barrino would not be involved with the film.

Aretha Franklin expressed her fascination in hearing Barrino appear in a forthcoming biographical film in 2011.

RCA Music Group, Arista Records, and Jive Records announced on October 7, along with Arista Records and Jive Records, that J Records was disbanding J Records. Barrino (and all other musicians who have signed to these three labels) and all other artists who have signed to these three labels) will debut her future work on the RCA Records label as a result of the shutdown.

Barrino was ranked 32nd out of the 100 Greatest Women in Music on February 13, 2012.

Barrino was included on a photo shoot of Cyndi Lauper's "True Colors" with Kelly Price and Faith Evans from Evans' compilation album R&B Divas, which was released on October 2, 2012.

Barrino debuted her new song, "Lose to Win," on December 19, 2012. Barrino revealed that the album's release date would be March 13, 2013. Barrino revealed on February 28, 2013, 2013, on her Facebook page, that her album would be released on April 23, 2013. On March 19, 2013, the album was available for pre-order.

Barrino revealed on April 19, 2013 that "Without Me" would be her next single, starring Kelly Rowland and Missy Elliott.

Barrino embarked on a five-date tour with Andrea Bocelli in June 2013. She announced that she would return to Broadway in October 2013 in a interview with Today in the same month.

After Midnight, the musical revue that opened on Broadway on November 3, 2013, Barrino appeared in After Midnight, which opened on Broadway on November 3, 2013, with previews beginning on October 18 at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre. On February 9, 2014, she came to a conclusion. Critics had lauded her work. "I admired Ms. Barrino's heartfelt appearance in 'The Color Purple,' but I was amazed at how effortlessly and intuitively she slid into the persona of a jazz singer," the New York Times said. Barrino was the first of a rotating roster of special guest stars that also included k.d. lang, Toni Braxton, and Babyface. Barrino would return to the theatre for a second week starting on May 13 to June 8. At the 68th Tony Awards, Barrino performed with the cast, Patti LaBelle, and Gladys Knight.

Barrino co-wrote and recorded The Butler's theme song "In the Middle of the Night" in August 2013.

Barrino was inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame on October 16, 2014. Barrino appeared on Dave Koz's new Christmas album, December 25, which contained a series of Christmas-themed duets. The album was released on September 30, 2014. Barrino teamed up with former Destiny's Child actor Michelle Williams in November 2014 to produce a reversal of Williams' "If We Had Our Eyes." Barrino revealed in November that she had begun work on her next album in November. On her official Instagram account, she posted a short clip of her and R. Kelly in the studio. The first single from the album, "No Time for It," was released on January 7, 2016. Barrino is working with music executive and producer Ron Fair.

Barrino began touring with Anthony Hamilton in Buffalo, New York, on April 21, 2016. The Definition Of... was released in the United States on July 29, 2016, debuting at number six on the Billboard 200 Chart, selling 32,000 units. The album also topped Billboard's Billboard R&B Albums Chart for the second week. Barrino's fourth top ten albums appears on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Album's chart, making it Barrino's fourth top ten album on the market. The new album featured two top ten singles on the Adult R&B Songs airplay chart: "No Time for It," which peaked at number six, and "Sleeping With the One I Love," which peaked at number nine.

Barrino announced Christmas After Midnight on October 6, 2017, via Concord, after parting ways with longtime label home RCA Records. She promoted the album by embarking on the Christmas After Midnight Tour.

Barrino performed at Aretha Franklin's funeral on August 31, 2018.

At the 2019 Grammy Awards, she, Andra Day and Yolanda Adams, and then At Aretha Franklin paid tribute to Aretha Franklin, both at Aretha Franklin and Yolanda Adams on February 10, 2019, as well as Aretha Franklin. Filmmaker Tyler Perry hosted a Grammy Celebration for the Queen of Souls. Barrino appeared at Motown 60: A Grammy Celebration, which took place on April 21, 2019. "My Guy" was a song she sang in honor of Mary Wells.

Barrino announced on March 9, 2019 that her forthcoming sixth studio album, Sketchbook, is complete and will feature 14 tracks. The album will feature features from Meghan Trainor, T-Pain, T.I., Jazmine Sullivan, and Brandy, according to Barrino. "Enough" was the album's first single, and it was released on May 3, 2019. The single debuted at number nine on the Billboard Adult R&B Songs chart, peaking at number nine. This marks her twelfth top-ten hits on the charts.

Barrino's theme song "Shine" for Tamron Hall's daytime talk show "Shine" was released in September 2019.

Barrino will reprise her role as Celie in the forthcoming film musical version of The Color Purple on February 3rd, 2022.

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