Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston

The best-selling female performer of the 1990s and one of the most popular artists through the 2010s, Mariah Carey rose to superstardom on the strength of her stunning five-octave voice. An elastic talent who moved easily from glossy ballads to hip-hop-inspired dance-pop, she earned frequent comparison to rivals Whitney Houston and Celine Dion, but did them both one better by co-writing almost all her material. Like all artists with lengthy periods in the mainstream spotlight, Carey experienced creative and commercial lulls, yet each one of her proper studio albums peaked with...