Whitney Houston

Whitney Houston, the gospel-inspired pop singer who sold more than 140 million albums with her emotive renditions of such hits as "Greatest Love of All" and "I Will Always Love You," and who struggled with drug abuse and a troubled marriage, died Feb. 11 in Beverly Hills, Calif. She was 48. A police official told the Associated Press that Ms. Houston was pronounced dead Saturday afternoon in her room at the Beverly Hilton hotel and that no signs of "criminal intent" had been found.

On Feb. 9, 2012, Brian McKnight attended record producer Clive Davis's pre-Grammy party at the Beverly Hilton and ran into his old friend Whitney Houston . Two days later, Houston was dead. "She looked good, and I should have told her that," the R&B singer-songwriter recalls. "I don't like to be saying the same thing to her that everyone else is always saying, but when she passed, I thought maybe I should have said it anyway. "To me, when she was at her best, she was the greatest female singer...

Unless you count the box sets and rarities packages sure to come, the " Sparkle " soundtrack contains what will be the last music ever released by Whitney Houston. Houston co-produced "Sparkle," a remake of the 1976 musical about three singing sisters and their single mom that now takes place in 1960s Detroit, and co-starred alongside clean-scrubbed and perpetually underrated "American Idol" winner Jordin Sparks. Most of the original "Sparkle" soundtrack was written by Curtis Mayfield and performed by Aretha Franklin, and...

Even when she sings about the flames of passion, Alicia Keys's veins pump ice water. The 32-year-old R&B star was deft and meticulous at the Verizon Center on Sunday night, ruminating on the hottest of human emotions with cool precision. The performance lacked personality and spontaneity, but in her finest moments, Keys's moderation felt like elegance. And that's rare. Pop concerts of this scale are often compromises — singers either sacrifice the actual singing for breath-depleting choreography, or they plant their feet and...

The National Enquirer angered Whitney Houston fans Wednesday and instigated a deeper debate on the coverage of her death after publishing a photo purportedly showing the singer in a gold casket. The cover photo was taken during the funeral in New Jersey, the tabloid claims, and has been republished by other media outlets, including Jezebel and Fox411, Sarah Anne Hughes of Celebritology reports: It's not known how the Enquirer obtained the photo. Requests for comment from Houston's publicist and...

Whitney Houston's death, which rocked the music community and the world over the weekend, forced some last minute changes to the usually festive Grammy Awards Sunday night. As Chris Richards reported : Whitney Houston's unexpected death on the eve of Sunday's 54th Annual Grammy Awards turned the music industry's biggest night into a tone-dizzy exercise in grief, joy and show-must-go-on gusto. Even as the show was rolling on, details of Houston's death were emerging —...

NEWARK, N.J.(RNS) Marvin Winans is no stranger to fame. He comes from a musical gospel family known far and wide. Just say "the Winans" and people in the music world know who you're talking about. Marvin was the premier songwriter for the group, their albums top sellers spanning the 1980s and 1990s. Though he's a gospel giant, he has worked in the secular music world as well, fusing gospel and rhythm and blues with big names such as producer Teddy Riley. But at the end of the day, those in pastoral and gospel...

In his new book, "The Whitney I Knew," gospel artist BeBe Winans describes his 28-year friendship with singer Whitney Houston. Winans, 49, and his sister CeCe, performed with Houston, and sang at her funeral in February. His older brother, Marvin, gave the eulogy for Houston at New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, N.J. In an interview, Winans talked about the faith of the woman known just as "Whitney," and why he won't rush to see her in "Sparkle," the movie that opens Friday (Aug.

Among other things, the '00s will be remembered as the decade of the diva flameout, a long national nightmare of public crackups, disastrous marriages and no-panty flashings from which only Christina Aguilera has emerged unscathed. Whitney Houston, 46, has had the most spectacular catalogue of troubles -- rumors of hard-core substance abuse, her once-fabled voice poised at the edge of ruin, a marriage to bad-boy Bobby Brown -- and her comeback has taken the longest; at times it...

NEWARK, N.J. — Grammy Award winner and longtime family friend Marvin Winans will deliver the eulogy for Whitney Houston during her funeral Saturday (Feb. 18) at the New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, the church pastor said Tuesday night. Houston's family rejected a public final farewell to the pop icon, choosing instead to hold a private, invitation-only funeral at New Hope, the singer's childhood church, which seats about 1,500. The Rev. Joe A. Carter, pastor at New Hope Baptist Church, said he...

The initial media attention surrounding Clive Davis's " The Soundtrack of My Life " implied that the well-known record executive's autobiography overflows with dishy, music-industry gossip. Davis's decision to appear on Katie Couric's talk show and drop one of his memoir's key bombshells — that he's bisexual — helped foster that impression. So did Kelly Clarkson 's headline-generating denial of the tome's assertion that she "burst into hysterical sobbing" during a business meeting with Davis after he insisted she...

It's raining Whitney Houston memorials! Two days after Lifetime announced that it bought a one-hour Houston special "Remembering Whitney" — and about seven months after Houston's death — CBS announced that it will air a one-hour Houston special, "We Will Always Love You: A Grammy Salute to Whitney Houston," during the November sweeps. Lifetime's special boasts never-before-seen family photos and "candid insights" from Houston family members; those same relatives are starring in Lifetime's...

A sudsy, eye-catching bauble that should have been a pop-infused piece of escapism but instead turned into an unwitting elegy, " Sparkle " arrives freighted with more than its share of expectations. A remake of the beloved 1976 musical starring Irene Cara (and, not incidentally, featuring the music of Curtis Mayfield ), the updated version will forever be known as the final screen appearance of Whitney Houston , who died in February during post-production. ...

In his new book, "The Whitney I Knew," gospel artist BeBe Winans describes his 28-year friendship with singer Whitney Houston. Winans, 49, and his sister CeCe, performed with Houston, and sang at her funeral in February. His older brother, Marvin, gave the eulogy for Houston at New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, N.J. In an interview, Winans talked about the faith of the woman known just as "Whitney," and why he won't rush to see her in "Sparkle," the movie that opens Friday (Aug.

Unless you count the box sets and rarities packages sure to come, the " Sparkle " soundtrack contains what will be the last music ever released by Whitney Houston. Houston co-produced "Sparkle," a remake of the 1976 musical about three singing sisters and their single mom that now takes place in 1960s Detroit, and co-starred alongside clean-scrubbed and perpetually underrated "American Idol" winner Jordin Sparks. Most of the original "Sparkle" soundtrack was written by Curtis...

The Oprah Winfrey Network copped 3.5 million viewers Sunday night when Oprah interviewed Bobbi Kristina Brown , 19-year-old daughter of the late Whitney Houston. That's the largest audience in the network's 14-month history. The interview, which OWN was scheduled to rerun Monday night at 8, aired as part of its "Oprah's Next Chapter" franchise, in which the former syndicated daytime star travels here and there to meet and interview celebrities. OWN is a...

On the day Diane Sawyer was crowned anchor of ABC News's flagship evening newscast, she was seen on ABC News's "Good Morning America" pimping for Oprah Winfrey and Whitney Houston. ABC News had taped Whitney Houston's mini-concert in Central Park on Tuesday to air Wednesday. This was supposed to have been a comeback party for Houston. She was bad -- and not in a good way. ABC News apparently did not expect any actual news to come out of that concert. Otherwise they maybe should not have allowed actual journalists -- or at...

T he heartbreak of Whitney Houston's death does not seem to be primarily a story of drug or alcohol abuse, as it is currently unfolding. The so-called "teachable moment" about combining booze and drugs, it seems to me, misses the point. The more important question is: Why do people medicate themselves to such an extent? And even more compelling, what role does the public (and its drug dealer, the media) play in these unravelings? We get a glimpse of the answers in one of the many reels...

The National Enquirer angered Whitney Houston fans Wednesday and instigated a deeper debate on the coverage of her death after publishing a photo purportedly showing the singer in a gold casket. The cover photo was taken during the funeral in New Jersey, the tabloid claims, and has been republished by other media outlets, including Jezebel and Fox411, Sarah Anne Hughes of Celebritology reports: It's not known how the Enquirer obtained the photo. Requests for comment from Houston's publicist and...

I could not disagree more with Chris Richards 's critical commentary that the Grammy awards did not do a good enough job memorializing the recent death of singer Whitney Houston, whose extensive drug use took such a heavy toll on her music career. As a psychotherapist who treats many teens caught up in the devastating culture of illegal drug use, I know of no other venue where we would look askance at this type of extremely risky, and also illegal behavior, and laud it. Adulation beyond what was, in my opinion, a tasteful...