TAKE TWO: DEBORAH COX

Deborah Cox made her mark on the soul and pop charts in the '90's but it was on the dance floor where she was the true queen, achieving the feat of reaching the top of that chart twelve times.

Born and raised in Toronto, Cox began singing professionally at the age of twelve as she worked on television commercials and entered several talent contests. Even though she worked as a background vocalist for Celine Dion for a brief period, Cox struggled to break in to the Canadian music business. In 1994, she decided to give America a try and moved to Los Angeles. It didn't take long for her talent to be recognized here and Clive Davis quickly signed her to his Arista label.

The year after her arrival, Cox released her self-titled debut where the album found some success with the singles, "Sentimental" and "Who Do U Love" which became her first number one song on the dance chart. Cox received serious attention with a dance-mix of the song "Things Just Ain't The Same" for the soundtrack of the film, "Money Talks". This very popular single also reached the top of the dance charts.

The haunting ballad, "Nobody's Supposed to Be Here", the first single from the 1998 follow-up album, "One Wish", became a smash hit reaching number one on the r&b chart and a re-mix on the dance while it peaked at number two on the pop chart. Another single, "We Can't Be Friends", a duet with R.L. of the soul group, Next, also became a number one r&b hit and reached the top-ten on the pop chart. "It's Over Now" and "I Never Knew" from the album both became number one dance chart-toppers. "One Wish" would go on to sell over a million copies.

The third album, "The Morning After" came out in 2002 but didn't reach the same commercial heights of the previous record although Cox had three more number one dance songs including "Absolutely Not" from the "Dr. Dolittle 2" soundtrack.

Cox tested out her acting skills on Broadway with an acclaimed performance in the Elton John-Tim Rice musical "Aida" in 2004. She left Arista Records and joined the label, Decca to release "Destination Moon", a jazz tribute album to legendary vocalist, Dinah Washington. The singer released her last studio album to date in 2008, "The Promise", a collection of r&b songs that featured another number one dance re-mix hit , "Beautiful U R".

Although she's been busy raising her three young children, Cox continues to perform, recently appearing on Broadway again with a revival of the musical "Jekyll & Hyde" in 2012 and there are plans for some new music. In the meantime, let's listen to two classic songs by Deborah Cox:

"Sentimental" - Deborah Cox (1995) mp3

"Things Just Ain't The Same (Dance Remix)" - Deborah Cox (1997) mp3