Famous American Pop Singer Whitney
Houston, has died at 48. Houston's publicist confirmed the singer's death to ABC News. The cause of death is not yet known.
Six police cars were spotted in front of the Beverly Hilton hotel today, where Houston was staying. TMZ reports that paramedics were called there this afternoon and found Houston unresponsive in her hotel room.
According
to TMZ, paramedics' attempts at CPR failed and Houston was pronounced
dead at 3:55 p.m. PT. TMZ reports that there were no signs of foul play.
Houston
was last seen publicly on Thursday, when she appeared disheveled and
disoriented in front of a Hollywood nightclub. According to the
Hollywood Reporter, she got into an altercation with "X Factor" finalist
Stacy Francis on Thursday at an event where she was said to be acting
"belligerent."
Houston
returned to rehab in May of last year seeking treatment for drug and
alcohol dependence. "Whitney voluntarily entered the program to support
her long-standing recovery process," her publicist said at the time.
The
six-time Grammy winner staged a comeback in 2009, but was dogged by
rumors that she was using drugs again. That year, she told Oprah Winfrey
that marijuana laced with cocaine was her substance of choice during
her 1992 to 2006 marriage to R&B singer Bobby Brown. They have a
daughter together, Houston's only child, Bobbi Kristina Houston Brown.
Houston's appearance on "Oprah" was her first major television interview since 2002, when she talked to ABC News' Diane Sawyer.
At
the time, Sawyer asked Houston about ongoing drug rumors that had
started in 2000, when airport security guards found marijuana in Houston
and Brown's bags at a Hawaiian airport. The singer alluded to having
used cocaine, pills and marijuana -- but drew the line at crack in what
turned into an infamous rant.
"First
of all, let's get one thing straight," she told Sawyer. "Crack is
cheap. I make too much money to ever smoke crack. Let's get that
straight. OK? We don't do crack. We don't do that. Crack is wack."
In
August 2009, Houston released "I Look to You," her first studio album
in seven years. It sold 304,000 copies in its first seven days on the
market, sending Houston back to the top of the charts and giving her the
best debut week of her career.
In
2010, Houston launched her "Nothing but Love" world tour. Though some
said Houston's signature voice showed the stress of her ups and downs,
she soldiered on, putting on shows in Asia, Australia and Europe even
though fans and critics panned her performances.
At
her peak in the 1990s, Houston was a force to be reckoned with in the
music industry. She was one of the world's best-selling artists, selling
out stadiums with powerful, poignant renditions of her greatest hits
like "I Wanna Dance With Somebody," "How Will I Know," and "I Will
Always Love You."
Houston
won six Grammy awards, two Emmys, 30 Billboard Music Awards, and 22
American Music Awards, among others. Her album "Whitney" was the first
album by a woman to ever debut at No. 1 on the Billboard Charts. She has
sold more than 170 million albums world wide.
Her
success launched her into the film industry, where she starred in hits
like "The Bodyguard" and "Waiting to Exhale." Her struggles with drugs,
alcohol, rehab (she went at least three times) and Brown, against whom
she filed a charge of domestic abuse in 1993, pushed her out the
spotlight.
In
2009, talking to Winfrey about why she took a break from show business,
Houston said, "It was too much. So much to try to live up to, to try to
be, and I wanted out."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
