Word: diva
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...took Cole Porter to prove Lisa Stansfield really had soul. On Red Hot + Blue, a 1990 tribute album to Porter, she contributed a sublimely sophisticated version of Down in the Depths. The song showed off the pop-soul diva's skills as a vocal interpreter; the number also demonstrated how good she could be when her material was as strong as her sure, supple voice...
...Whitney Houston can do it, why can't MARIAH CAREY? The diva of deep record sales is dipping her toes into the waters of acting. The video for her new song, Honey, which debuts this week, opens with a comedy sketch, after which she scampers around like a Bond girl (read: lots of changes into different, but equally skimpy, outfits). She's also in discussions about doing a movie. "It's a great way to release different creative energy," Carey says of acting. Her music is also changing--away from touchy-feely ballads to more collaborations with hip-hop artists...
...ultimately mercenary ghetto-sex-bomb posturing of rappers Foxy Brown and Lil' Kim, the emotionally blunt crooning of talented teen singer Aaliyah and even the admirably artsy neo-soul stylings of Erykah Badu all have roots in Blige's success. But Blige was the original round-the-way diva; her hard, up-from-the-projects exterior made her raw vocals that much more affecting. Says producer Jimmy Jam, who worked with Blige on World: "People can copy her, but no one can match her emotion...
DIED. LAVERN BAKER, 67, 1950s rhythm-and-blues diva; from complications of diabetes; in New York City. During the early rock-'n'-roll era, white performers found success by making cover versions of such hits of hers as 1954's Teedlee Dee, but Baker got belated revenge when she was inducted into rock's Hall of Fame...
...Smilla. Up to now she has trafficked largely in vulnerability--melting in Legends of the Fall, perhaps a shade too winsome in Sabrina. Here, she is all contained fury, except for the flashes of anger and contempt that burst without warning from the darkness within. It's not exactly diva acting such as we used to get from the great ladies of the movies' classic era. She achieves her effects with less obvious calculation. But like a Barbara Stanwyck or a Bette Davis, she takes us into that country where strength shades into neurosis, and we fear that...