Alicia Keys

Alicia Keys helped redefine the term "overnight sensation" when her 2001 debut effort, Songs In A Minor, sold more than 50,000 copies during its first day of release. Mixing R&B songcraft with a sultry dose of neo-soul, the album went on to move more than ten million units worldwide, officially establishing the young Alicia Keys (who was only 19 during the recording process) as an international star. Although she shared the charts with such R&B contemporaries as Destiny's Child, Keys' talents distinguished her as a different sort of diva, one who played a variety of instruments and penned the vast majority of her songs without outside help. The Diary Of Alicia Keys solidified her popularity two years later, and Alicia Keys spent the rest of the decade refining her now-signature sound.