From The Mickey Mouse Club to the “Lady Marmalade” brothels of New Orleans – Christina Aguilera and her remarkable four-octave vocal range have seen it all.
The 42-year-old pop icon transformed herself from a teen idol into a sassy, scantily clad sex symbol, all the while managing to keep the focus on her singing. No easy feat.
Now in a victory lap marking 25 years in show business, Aguilera is making her debut in Israel this week, arriving to perform before some 15,000 fans on August 10 at Live Park in Rishon Lezion.
“Shalom Israel, I’m so excited to finally make my way to Tel Aviv. This’ll be my first performance in Israel,” said Aguilera in a video to promote the show. “See you at Live Park on August 10 for an unforgettable night.”
That is likely true, as Aguilera is known to put on one of the liveliest shows in the pop world.
Adding to the reverie will be the guest appearance of local favorite Eden Ben Zaken for a duet performance of the Aguilera standard “Hurt,” with which the Israeli singer auditioned to gain entry to The X Factor, which launched her thriving career.
“I am excited about the collaboration with Christina Aguilera, one of the greatest singers in the world,” Ben Zaken said in a statement. “It’s a thrilling moment for me and I’m sure it will be an amazing experience for both of us.”
Christina Aguilera: A career filled with reinvention
Since she broke onto the global musical consciousness with her first big hit, “Genie in a Bottle,” in 1999, and won a Grammy Award for Best New Artist, Aguilera has regularly reinvented herself. Emerging at the same time as fellow Mouseketeer Britney Spears, Aguilera was always considered the brassy diva of the bunch, which also included Justin Timberlake and Ryan Gosling, among others. The All Music Guide called the song Aguilera’s Rolling Stones to Britney Spears’s Beatles.
That image only expanded in 2001 when Aguilera joined Missy Elliot, P!nk, and M.I.A. for the era-defining cover of “Lady Marmalade” for the film Moulin Rouge. She further distanced herself from her teenage colleagues in 2002 with her very adult-like second album, Stripped, which features sizzling R&B like “Dirrtty” and her signature ballad “Beautiful.”
By 2006’s Back to Basics, any semblance of her teen years were left in the dust, as her status as a pop diva was cemented.
Throughout her career, Aguilera has sold more than 75 million records worldwide. She’s won six Grammy Awards, including one Latin Grammy Award, and was the only artist under the age of 30 included in Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 100 greatest singers of all time.
In the 2000s, she began a second career as a judge on The Voice and recorded a duet with fellow judge Adam Levine on Maroon 5’s massive hit “Moves Like Jagger.” Her recording career continued to focus on dance and R&B music with 2012’s Lotus and 2018’s Liberation. Last year, she released the Spanish-language Aguilera.
Aguilera has always been a favorite in Israel, with listeners of the pop station Galgalatz selecting “Beautiful” as one of the best song of the 2000s. Fans who have waited for 20 years to sing along Aguilera will finally get their chance on Thursday night.
