Biography of Barbra StreisandBarbra Streisand (pronounced STRY-sand, IPA: /ˈstraɪsænd/; born April 24, 1942) is an American singer and actress. She has also achieved some notability as a composer, political activist, film producer and director. She has won Oscars for Best Actress and Best Original Song as well as multiple Emmy Awards, Grammy Awards, and Golden Globe Awards.
She is considered one of the most commercially and critically successful female entertainers in modern entertainment history and one of the best selling solo recording artists in the US, with RIAA-certified shipments of over 71 million albums. Because of that, she's the #1 female solo artist in the USA. She has sold approximately 145 Million albums worldwide.
She was born Barbara Joan Streisand in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, to Jewish American parents. Her father, Emanuel Streisand, a grammar school teacher who emigrated from Vienna, Austria, died when she was 15 months old; she had a turbulent relationship with her stepfather, Louis Kind. She has a half-sister from her mother's second marriage, Roslyn Kind, who was also a performer.
Her mother, Diana, a school secretary, did not encourage her daughter to pursue a show business career, opining that Barbara was not attractive enough, and encouraged Barbara to learn to type. Streisand attended Erasmus Hall High School, where she graduated fourth in her class in 1959, and where she sang in the school choir with Neil Diamond. She was also friendly there with future World Chess Champion Bobby Fischer. She never attended college.
After a music competition, Streisand became a nightclub singer while in her teens. She originally wanted to be an actress and appeared in a number of Off-Off-Broadway productions, including one with then-aspiring actress Joan Rivers, but when her boyfriend Barry Dennen helped her create a club act — first performed in a gay bar in Manhattan's Greenwich Village in 1960; she achieved success as a singer. It was at this time that she shortened her first name to Barbra to make it more distinctive.
In 1962 Streisand first appeared on Broadway, in the small but star-making role of Miss Marmelstein in the musical I Can Get It for You Wholesale. She also signed her first recording contract that year with Columbia Records.
Her first album, The Barbra Streisand Album, won two Grammy Awards in 1963. Her recording success continued, and at one time Streisand's first three albums appeared simultaneously on Billboard's pop albums Top Ten - an unusual feat considering it was at a time when rock and roll and The Beatles dominated the charts.
One notable TV special was a documentation of her 1967 free concert in New York's Central Park, at which she sang to a crowd of some 135,000 people.
Streisand has recorded more than 60 albums, almost all with the Columbia Records label. Streisand has stamped nearly every song she has sung with her unique style of interpretation. Her early works in the 1960s (her debut, The Second Barbra Streisand Album, The Third Album, My Name Is Barbra, etc.) are considered classic renditions of theatre and nightclub standards, including her version of "Happy Days Are Here Again". Beginning with My Name Is Barbra, her albums were often medley-filled keepsakes of her television specials.
Starting in 1969, Streisand tackled contemporary songwriters, but like many "talented" singers of the day, she found herself a fish out of water in attempts to tackle rock. But her vocal talents prevailed, and she gained newfound success with the pop and ballad-oriented Richard Perry-produced album Stoney End in 1971. The title track, written by Laura Nyro, was a big hit for Streisand.
During the 1970s, she was also highly prominent in the pop charts, with number-one records like "The Way We Were", "Evergreen", "No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)" (with Donna Summer) and "Woman in Love"; some of these came from soundtrack records to her films.
As the 1970s ended, Streisand was named the most successful female singer in the U.S. - only Elvis Presley and The Beatles had sold more albums. In 1982, New York Times music critic Stephen Holden wrote that Streisand was "the most influential mainstream American pop singer since Frank Sinatra."
Streisand returned to her musical-theater roots with 1985's The Broadway Album, which was unexpectedly successful, holding the coveted #1 Billboard position for 3 straight weeks, and being certified 4x Platinum. The album featured songs reworked by Stephen Sondheim especially for this recording, was critically acclaimed, nominated as Album of the Year and landed Streisand her 8th Grammy as Best Female Vocalist.
In 1991, a four-disc box set, Just for the Record, was released, spanning Streisand's entire career. It featured over 70 tracks, including live material, greatest hits, and rarities, from her early recordings up to 1991.
Streisand's concert fundraising events helped propel former President Bill Clinton into the spotlight and into office. Streisand later introduced Clinton at his inauguration in 1992. Streisand's music career, however, was on hold. A tour was suggested, and she debated it for two years because of her stage fright. A year later, Streisand landed another #1 Back to Broadway. This album included the duet medley I Have A Love / One Hand, One Heart with the legendary Johnny Mathis whom Streisand said is one of her favorite singers.
In September 1993, Streisand made global news, announcing her first public concert tour in 27 years. Tickets to the limited tour were sold out in under one hour. Streisand also hit the cover of major magazines, in anticipation of what Time magazine named "The Music Event of the Century". The tour was one of the biggest all-media merchandise parlays in history. Ticket prices ranged from $50 to $1,500 - making Streisand the highest paid concert performer in history. Barbra Streisand: The Concert went on to be the top grossing concert of the year, earned five Emmy Awards and the Peabody Award, and the taped broadcast on HBO is, to date, the highest rated concert special in HBO's 30 year history.
On New Year's Eve 1999, she returned to the concert stage, giving the highest grossing single concert in Las Vegas history to date. At the end of the last millennium, she was the number one female singer in the US, with at least two #1 albums in each decade since she began performing.
Her most recent albums have been Christmas Memories (2001), a collection of somber holiday songs, and The Movie Album (2003), featuring famous movie themes and backed by a large symphony orchestra. Guilty Pleasures (called Guilty Too in the UK), a collaboration with Barry Gibb and a sequel album to their previous Guilty, was released worldwide in 2005.
In February 2006, Streisand recorded the song Smile alongside Tony Bennett at Streisand's Malibu home. The song is included on Tony Bennett's 80th Birthday Album, Duets. In September 2006, the pair filmed a live performance of the song for a special directed by Rob Marshall entitled Tony Bennett: An American Classic. The special aired on NBC Television November 21, 2006, and was released on DVD the same day. Streisand's duet with Bennett opens the special.
In advance of four concerts (two each in Los Angeles and New York) in September 2000, Streisand announced she was retiring from future paying public concerts. Her performance of the song People was broadcast on the Internet via America Online.
In 2006, Streisand came out of retirement and announced her intent to tour again, in an effort to raise money and awareness for multiple issues. After four days of rehearsal at the Sovereign Bank Arena in Trenton, New Jersey, the tour began on October 4 at the Wachovia Center in Philadelphia and concluded at Staples Center in Los Angeles on November 20, 2006. Special guests Il Divo were interwoven throughout the show. On stage closing night, Streisand hinted that six more concerts may follow on foreign soil. The show was known as Streisand: The Tour.
On October 9, 2006, Streisand performed a concert at the Madison Square Garden, featuring a skit that made fun of President George W. Bush. When one heckler continued to yell repeated taunts during and long after the skit had ended, Streisand responded by shouting "Shut the fuck up!" She later apologized, but added that "The artist's role is to disturb." Ultimately, Streisand endured negative reaction to the sketch at only two out of her twenty concert dates. It was thought that an audience member in Fort Lauderdale threw liquid from a cup at her because of the skit, but the incident was found to be non-political.
Streisand's 20-concert tour set record box office numbers. At the age of 64, well past the prime of most performers, she grossed $92,457,062 and set house gross records in 14 of the 16 arenas played on the tour. She set the third place record for her October 9, 2006 show at Madison Square Garden, the first and second place records of which are held by her two shows in September 2000. She set the second place record at the MGM Grand Garden Arena, with her December 31, 1999 show being the house record and the highest grossing concert of all time. This led many people to openly criticize Streisand for price gouging, as many tickets sold upwards of 1,000 dollars.
A collection of performances culled from different stops on this tour, Live in Concert 2006, debuted at #7 on the Billboard 200, making it Streisand's 29th Top 10 album. In the summer of 2007, Streisand gave concerts for the first time in continental Europe. The first concert took place in Zürich (June 18), then Vienna (June 22), Paris (June 26), Berlin (June 30), Stockholm (July 4, cancelled), Manchester (July 10) and Celbridge, near Dublin (July 14), followed by three concerts in London (July 18, 22 & 25), the only European city where Streisand had performed before 2007. Tickets for the London dates cost between £100.00 and £1,500.00 and for the Ireland date between €118.00 and €500.00.
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