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Robyn Rihanna Fenty ( /riˈɑËÂnə/ ree-AH-nə or /riˈænə/ ree-AN-ə; born February 20, 1988), known mononymously as Rihanna, is a Barbadian recording artist and actress. Born in Saint Michael, Barbados, Rihanna began her career when she met record producer Evan Rogers in late 2003. At age 16, she came to the United States to pursue a recording career and began recording demo tapes under Rogers' guidance. She subsequently signed a contract with Def Jam Recordings after auditioning for Jay-Z.[1]Rihanna rose to fame following the release of her debut album Music of the Sun (2005), which peaked in the top ten of the Billboard 200 chart and features the Billboard Hot 100 top five hit single "Pon de Replay". In less than a year, she released her second studio album, A Girl Like Me (2006), which peaked within the top-five in the United States, and produced her first Hot 100 number one single, "SOS". Rihanna's third studio album, Good Girl Gone Bad released in May 2007, spawned the international hit singles "Umbrella", "Don't Stop the Music", "Take a Bow" and "Disturbia", with an additional four singles being released. The album was nominated for nine Grammy Awards, winning Best Rap/Sung Collaboration for "Umbrella". Her fourth studio album Rated R (2009), produced the top-ten singles "Russian Roulette", "Hard" and "Rude Boy", with the latter achieving the number-one spot on the Billboard Hot 100. Loud (2010), Rihanna's fifth studio album, spawned the number-one hits "Only Girl (In the World)", "What's My Name?" and "S&M". Rihanna's sixth studio album, Talk That Talk (2011) served number-one hit "We Found Love" and top-five single "Where Have You Been". Her upcoming seventh studio album, Unapologetic (2012) spawned top five single "Diamonds"Rihanna's work has earned her numerous awards and accolades, including five American Music Awards, eighteen Billboard Music Awards, two BRIT Awards and five Grammy Awards. She has achieved a total of eleven number one singles on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, becoming the youngest solo artist to achieve the feat.[2] Billboard named Rihanna the Digital Songs Artist of the 2000s decade, and ranked her as the seventeenth artist of the same decade.[3][4] She is the highest-selling digital artist in US history, having sold 47,571,000 singles as of 2012.[5] Furthermore, she has also shipped 7.3 million album units in the United States as of September 2011.[6] Some of her singles have earned their place on the list of best-selling singles worldwide. Rihanna has sold more than 25 million albums and 60 million digital singles worldwide since the beginning of her career in 2005, which makes her one of the best selling artists of all time.[7] In June 2011, Forbes reported that Rihanna had earned $29 million between May 2010 and May 2011.[8] In 2012, American magazine Time named Rihanna one of the most influential people in the world and was also ranked the fourth most powerful celebrity in 2012 with earnings of $53 million between May 2011 and May 2012, according to Forbes.[9][10] Also in 2012, Rihanna was named the top artist of Billboard's Pop Songs Artists of 1992–2012 and the UK's second biggest selling female singles artist of all time with a combined singles sales tally as a lead artist of 11.4 million.