Five things you didn’t know about Alicia Keys

1 Keys says her ability to make music that connects with people from all over the world is down to her biracial heritage. Born in Harlem, New York on January 25, 1981, the only child Keys was raised by her mother, Teresa Augello (half Italian and half English, Irish, and Scottish descent), in the Hell's Kitchen area of Manhattan. Her father, Craig Cook, is African-American and left when Keys was just 2 years.
2 Keys met her husband, the rapper Swiss Beatz, when she wrote and co-produced the song Million Dollar Bill for Whitney Houston in 2009. Houston requested to work with Keys after hearing her perform at one of Clive Davis' parties. Fittingly, Beatz produced the beat and Keys joined him in the songwriting process and the duo completed the song. In May that year, it emerged Beatz — already married — and Keys were romantically involved. A year later, the pair were engaged and expecting a baby. In the summer of 2010, the couple had their unborn child honoured in a Zulu ceremony, which took place in the Illovo suburb of Johannesburg, South Africa, as well as a wedding celebration on the French island of Corsica in July. Egypt Daoud Ibarr Dean was born in October in New York City; soon after Keys recorded a song called Speechless, dedicated to her son.
3 Alicia Keys was almost Alicia Wilde, a stage name she picked herself, until her long-time manager Jeff Robinson suggested Keys after a dream he had. Her birth name is Alicia Augello Cook but her friends (mostly on Twitter) call her Lellow.
4 No stranger to life in front of a lens, in 1985, aged just 4, Keys made an appearance on The Cosby Show as one of Rudy Huxtable's sleepover guests in the episode Slumber Party. Keys made guest appearances on several television series including her most famous on Charmed. She made her film debut in Smokin' Aces alongside Ben Affleck, Andy Garcia, Chris Pine, Ryan Reynolds, and Jeremy Piven and went on to appear in The Nanny Diaries with Scarlett Johansson and Laura Linney. In 2008 she appeared in The Secret Life of Bees with Queen Latifah, Jennifer Hudson, Sophie Okonedo, and Dakota Fanning, which earned her a nomination at the NAACP Image Awards.
5 This year Keys teamed up with Greater Than Aids to launch EMPOWERED, a new campaign targeted at women in the US. As a force in the global fight against Aids, Keys has dedicated her work in philanthropy to help bring attention to the urgency of HIV/Aids.
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