Although she started her career beatboxing for a rap group called Ladies Fresh, Queen Latifah (born Dana Elaine Owens) soon stepped out on her own making solo records on the Tommy Boy label. While hardly the first of the female rappers, she is certainly one who has had a very prominent career. She parlayed her music career into other outlets like television shows (like
Living Single and her own talk show) and on the silver screen (in
Chicago,
Bringing Down the House,
Beauty Shop,
Hairspray and many more).
