Biography
The Columbian singer-songwriter, Shakira Isabel Mebarak Ripoll, was born on February 2, 1977, in Barraquilla, Colombia. She is also a dancer, musician, record producer and a philanthropist.
Shakira wrote her first poem at the age of four and she was fascinated by her father who used to write stories on a typewriter and wanted one herself. At that age she heard a doumbek and she loved it so much that she started dancing on a table in a restaurant. After she grew, in the second grade she couldn’t enter the school choir because her vibrato was too strong and her music teacher told her that she had the voice of a goat. After that she passed through a hard time when her father was declared bankrupt and her parents had to sell some things they’ve owned.
Between ten and thirteen Shakira started participating in various events in Barraquilla, and then she met local theater producer Monica Ariza who helped her to with the career. Her first audition wasn’t a success, but the second one was impressive and she signed a contract to record three albums.
Shakira’s first album, Pies Descalzos, was released in 1995, then in 1998 the second one Donde Estan Los Lodrones?, the third one in 2001 Laundry Service, Fijacion Oral Vol.1 and Oral Fixation both in 2005, and TBA in 2009. She recorded other three live albums and four compilation albums as well as a soundtrack in 2007 for the film Love in the Time of Cholera. For all her hard work, Shakira won three Grammy Awards and eighth Latin Grammy Awards. She also won three Billboard Music Awards, twelve Latin Billboard Awards, one MTV European Music Award, four MTV Video Music Awards, eleven MTV Latin Music Awards, three ALMA Awards, four NRJ Music Awards France, twelve Premios Lo Nuestro, two American Music Award, four World Music Award, one People’s Choice Award, two Much Music Canada Award, one Echo Awards and one Los Primios Telehit.
