JANET_FAN™☆

Janet Damita Jo Jackson (born May 16, 1966) is an American recording artist and entertainer. Born in Gary, Indiana and raised in Encino, California, she is the youngest member of the Jackson family of musicians. She first performed on stage with her family beginning at the age of seven, and later started her career as an actress with the variety television series The Jacksons (1976). She went on to star in other television shows throughout the 1970s and early 1980s, including Good Times (1977) and Diff'rent Strokes (1981).Jackson faced initial difficulties after launching her recording career in 1982, often criticized for having a limited vocal range and being yet another child from the Jackson family to become a recording artist. However, with the collaboration of record producers Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, Jackson found record-breaking success, producing five consecutive number one studio albums on the Billboard 200; these include Control (1986), Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation 1814 (1989), janet. (1993), The Velvet Rope (1997), and All for You (2001). Jackson has been regarded as one of the most influential recording artists in the history of contemporary R&B, as her music has incorporated elements of rap music with sample loop, triple swing and industrial beats, which led to crossover appeal in popular music.She became a pop icon in the late 1980s, renowned for her critically acclaimed, innovative multi-platinum albums, music videos and choreography. Jackson was recognized as a role model for youth for her socially conscious music; her public image later developed into that of a sex symbol, as her music began to explore sexuality. The 1990s established her as one of the highest paid artists in the recording industry, signing two record-breaking multi-million dollar recording contracts with Virgin Records; she later emerged the second most successful artist of the decade.Though Jackson is listed by the Recording Industry Association of America as the eleventh best-selling female artist in the United States with 26 million certified albums, Billboard magazine named her one of the top-ten selling artists in the history of contemporary music, having sold over 100 million albums worldwide.[1][2] Amidst her recording career, Jackson has also starred in feature films since the mid-1990s. Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married? (2007), for which Jackson won a NAACP Image Award, became her third consecutive film to open at number one at the box office, following Poetic Justice (1993) and Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (2000). Janet Jackson was born in Gary, Indiana, the youngest of nine children to Katherine Esther (née Scruse) and Joseph Walter Jackson.[3] The Jacksons were lower-middle class and devout Jehovah's Witnesses. By the time she was a toddler, her older brothers—Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, Marlon and Michael—were performing on stage at nightclubs and theaters as The Jackson 5. In March 1969, the group signed a record deal with Motown, and by the end of the year they had recorded the first of four consecutive number-one singles. The Jackson 5's success allowed the family to move to the Encino neighborhood of Los Angeles, California in 1971,[3] where they settled in a gated mansion called "Hayvenhurst." Although born into a family of professional musicians, Jackson—whose love of horses initially inspired her to become a race-horse jockey—had no aspiration to become an entertainer. Her father, however, planned for her to follow in the family's footsteps. Jackson commented, "No one ever asked me if I wanted to go into show business... it was expected."[3]In 1974, at the age of seven, Jackson appeared on stage in Las Vegas, Nevada with her siblings in a routine show at the MGM Casino.[3] Jane Cornwell documented in her biography of the singer, Janet Jackson (2002), that "Janet was only eight years old when [her father] told her not to call him "Dad" anymore. As her manager, he would henceforth be addressed as "Joseph".[3] She began her career as an actress with the debut of the CBS variety show The Jacksons (1976), in which she appeared with her siblings Tito, Rebbie, Randy, Michael, Marlon, La Toya and Jackie.[3] In 1977, Jackson was selected by producer Norman Lear to play a recurring role in the sitcom Good Times.[3] She later recalled, "[Lear] cast me on Good Times as Penny Gordon, an abused child, because I could cry easily. There was a pain deep inside I could get to quickly, even as a little girl".[4] From 1979 to 1980, Jackson starred in A New Kind of Family as Jojo Ashton, and then joined the cast of Diff'rent Strokes, portraying Charlene Duprey from 1981 to 1982.[3] She played a recurring role during the fourth season of the television series Fame as Cleo Hewitt, and later commented that the series was not a project she enjoyed working on.[5][6]