Artist information

     Nicki Minaj's real name is Onika Tanya Maraj and she was born December 8th 1982 and she'll be 30 this year! She grew up in New York City borough of Queens but was born in Saint James, Trinidad and Tobago. She was signed to Young Money Entertainment after releasing three mixtapes between 2007 and 2009. In November 2010 Nicki Minaj released her debut album Pink Friday which debuted 2nd on US Billboard 200 after one week, selling 375,000 copies then becoming number one! It has sold more than 1.7 million copies and has been certified platinum!

     Until the age of 5 she lived with her grandmother in Saint James then her mother one day picked her up to move to Queens but before that she would only visit occasionally. Nicki Minaj's father was an alcoholic and took drugs and according to Minaj he once tried to kill her mother by setting the house on fire! She has always been passionate about music, she even played clarinet while she attended Elizabeth Blackwell Middle School and then went to LaGuardia High School which specialised in music and preforming arts.

Nicki Minaj and her mother Nina.

     Nicki Minaj has many alter egos, she even shows some of them through her music, she said home life was chaotic and she would create these alter egos to 'escape' from all the arguing between her parents. Her first identity was 'Cookie' then 'Harajuku Barbie' then came 'Nicki Minaj'. On November 18th 2010 Minaj visited her fans, in The Garden of Dreams Foundation, wearing a colourful scarf around her head then came another alter ego called 'Nicki Teresa'. Other identity's she has are Roman Zolanski, Martha (which is Roman's mother) and Rosa. 

Minaj as Martha in Moment For Life.

     She has had many songs with other artists like Chris Brown, Drake, Lil Wayne, Rihanna, Big Sean and Justin Bieber etc. Also she is involved with Young Money Entertainment which is a record label founded by Lil Wayne, the current artists include Lil Wayne, Drake, Nicki Minaj, Tyga, Lloyd, Gudda Gudda, Mack Maine, Jae Millz, Cory Gunz, Lil Twist, Lil Chuckee, T-streets, Short Dawg and Shanell. The label has released six US number one albums!