Madonna Biography

Madonna Louise Veronica Ciccone Ritchie (born August 16, 1958 in Bay City, Michigan, United States), known as Madonna, is a dance-pop singer-songwriter, record and film producer, dancer, actress, author and fashion icon. She is noted for her ambitious music videos and stage performances as well as using political, sexual, and religious themes in her work.

In 2000, Guinness World Records listed Madonna as the most successful female recording artist of all time, with estimated worldwide sales of 120 million albums; in 2005, her record company credited her as having sold over 200 million albums worldwide. Madonna is the highest earning female singer of all time according to both the 2007 Guinness Book of Records and Billboard Magazine. Forbes magazine has estimated her net worth at $325 million. In addition, Madonna’s 2006 Confessions World Tour holds the record for the highest-grossing concert tour ever by a female artist.

After signing to Sire Records in 1982, her debut single “Everybody” was released in October of the same year. One year later, her debut album “Madonna” followed, and since then hits such as “Holiday,” “Like a Virgin” and “Like a Prayer” catapulted her to massive success. By the 1990s, her commercially successful albums, constantly reinvented image, groundbreaking music videos and controversial nature would earn her the title “Queen of Pop.”

According to the aforementioned Guinness Book of World Records, Madonna is the most successful female solo artist of all time. Apart from achieving twelve number one hits and thirty-seven top ten hits on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, she has garnered twenty MTV Video Music Awards (including the Video Vanguard Award), seven Grammy Awards, as well as a Best Actress (Musical or Comedy) Golden Globe Award for her performance in ‘Evita’. Two soundtrack cuts performed by Madonna, “Sooner or Later” and “You Must Love Me”, were awarded with Oscars.

Madonna’s most recent studio release, the 2005 album Confessions on a Dance Floor, co written & produced by Stuart Price previously known best for his remixes and as band member of Les Rythmes Digitales and Zoot Woman by set a new world record by going to No. 1 in a total of 40 countries, the most ever for an album. The lead single, Hung Up also set a record for going to No. 1 in 41 countries. “Hung Up” has become one of Madonna’s best selling singles ever with a total sales of 4.7+ million from digital, ringtones and single sales.