Jamaican-American singer-songwriter, deejay and musician Shaggy was born 56 years ago as Orville Richard Burrell in Kingston, Jamaica, is married and has 5 children.
When he 18 years old, Orville and his mum moved to New York and the following year he joined the US Marine Corps. He was discharged in 1992 with a lance corporal rank.
Burrell’s music career took off in 1993 and he released his debut album which included his number one UK hit cover version ‘Oh Carolina’, which was originally issued by the Folke Brothers in 1958. Afterwards, he collaborated with several producers regarding the hip-hop remix single ‘Nice and Lovely’. A second album came out in 1994 and the third one, released a year later, featured his number one international hit ‘Bombastic’. Another album was released during the rest of the 90s.
Orville’s 5th album ‘Hot Shot’ came out in the year 2000 and was extremely successful, so much so that it peaked to number one on the US Billboard 200 as well as on the UK Albums charts, and was also certified 6 x Platinum in the US. This album featured another 2 hit singles ‘It Wasn’t Me’ and ‘Angel’, which shot to first place on the music charts of several countries.
From then to this day, Shaggy had 12 more studio albums, 7 compilation, an extended play, 56 singles as lead singer (some of which were also sung in duet with other artists), and 29 singles as featured artist.
Apart from music, Orville appeared in a couple of movies and a few TV productions. He is also a philanthropist and in 2016 had begun a project named ‘Shaggy and friends’, and has donated a large sum of money to a Jamaican children’s hospital, plus equipment and machinery.
During his career so far, Shaggy received 2 Grammy, 2 Billboard Music and a Juno Award. In 2007, the Jamaican Order of Distinction honoured him with a Commander rank and in 2022, he obtained an Honorary Doctor of Fine Arts Degree.
*Image: no infringement intended. Source: rottentomatoes.com