Ariana Grande-Butera (born June 26, 1993) is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. She is the daughter of Joan Grande, the Brooklyn-born CEO of Hose-McCann Communications, a manufacturer of communications and safety equipment, and Edward Butera, a graphic design firm owner in Boca Raton.
Grande is of Italian descent, and she refers to herself as an Italian American of “half Sicilian and half Abruzzese” descent. She has an older half-brother, Frankie Grande, who is an entertainer and producer, and she has a close relationship with her maternal grandmother, Marjorie Grande. Grande’s family had moved from New York to Florida before her birth, and her parents separated when she was approximately nine or ten years old.
Serious
By age 13, she became serious about pursuing a music career, although she still concentrated on theatre. When she first arrived in Los Angeles, California to meet with her managers, she expressed a desire to record an R&B album: “I was like, ‘I want to make an R&B album,’ They were like ‘Um, that’s a helluva goal! Who is going to buy a 14-year-old’s R&B album?!’”
In 2008, Grande was cast in the supporting role of cheerleader Charlotte in the musical 13 on Broadway. When she joined the musical, Grande left North Broward Preparatory School, but continued to be enrolled; the school sent materials to her so she could study with tutors. She also sang various times in New York City. jazz club Birdland.
She is known for her expansive four-octave vocal range and whistle register. Born in Boca Raton, Florida Grande began her career in the 2008 Broadway musical 13. She rose to fame for her role as Cat Valentine in the Nickelodeon Television series Victorious (2010–2013) and Sam & Cat (2013–2014). She subsequently signed with Republic Records in 2011 after the label’s executives discovered Youtube Videos of her covering songs.
Her 1950s doo-wop-influenced pop and R&B debut album, Yours Truly (2013), topped the US Billboard 200 chart, while its lead single, ‘The way’, charted in the top ten of the US Billboard Hot 100.
Grande maintained her pop and R&B sound on her second and third studio albums, My Everything (2014), and Dangerous Woman (2016), with the former exploring EDM and producing the UK number-one singles ‘Problem’ and ‘Bang Bbang’ and the latter becoming her first of three consecutive number-one albums in the UK. Her trap-infused fourth and fifth studio albums, Sweetener (2018) and Thank U, Next (2019), were both critical and commercial successes.
The former won Grande a Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Album, while the latter was nominated for the Grammy Award for Album of the Year and set a record for the largest streaming week for a pop album. The singles ‘Thank U, Next’ ‘7Rings’, and ‘Break Up with Your Girlfriend, I’m Bored’ made Grande the first solo artist to hold the top three spots on the Billboard Hot 100 simultaneously, the first female to succeed herself at the top of the UK Singles Chart, and the first act to chart lead singles from each of their first five studio albums in the top ten of the Billboard Hot 100.
With her 2020 collaborations ‘Stuck with U’ and ‘Rain on Me’, she broke the record for the most number-one debuts on the Billboard Hot 100 and became the first artist to have their first four number-one singles debut atop the US charts.
Guinness records
Grande has received various accolades throughout her career, including one Grammy Award, one Brit Award, two Billboard Music Awards, three American Music Awards, nine MTV Video Music Awards, and eight Guinness World Records. Having amassed billions of streams thus far, she is the most streamed female artist on Spotify and Apple Music and is currently the most followed female on Spotify and YouTube.
She has been included on Time’s annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world Forbes’ list of the highest-paid women in music multiple times, while Billboard has honored her as Woman of the Year (2018) and the most accomplished female artist to debut in the 2010s. Outside of music, Grande is the most followed woman on Instagram and uses her influential platform to advocate for gender, racial, and LGBT equality; and her award-winning fragrance line has grossed over $500 million globally.