Alanis Nadine Morissette (born June 1, 1974) is a Canadian-born singer-songwriter, record producer, and actress. She has won 12 Juno Awards and seven Grammy Awards, and has sold over 55 million albums worldwide.

Morissette began her career in Canada, and as a teenager recorded two dance-pop albums, Alanis and Now Is the Time, under MCA Records. Her international debut album was the rock-influenced Jagged Little Pill, which remains the best-selling debut album by a female artist in the U.S., and the highest selling debut album worldwide in music history, selling 30 million records worldwide.

According to RIAA and United World Charts, Alanis is the biggest selling female rock artist in music. Her following album, Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie, was released in 1998 and was a success as well. Morissette took up producing duties for her subsequent albums, which include Under Rug Swept, So-Called Chaos and latest release Flavors of Entanglement. In February 2005, Morissette became a naturalized citizen of the United States while maintaining her Canadian citizenship.

Alanis Morissette was born in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, the daughter of Georgia Mary Ann Feuerstein, a Hungarian-born teacher, and Alan Richard Morissette, a French-Canadian high school principal.

Alanis has a twin brother, Wade, and an older brother, Chad. At the age of six, she began playing the piano and realized she wanted to express herself through the arts.

In 1984, Morissette wrote her first song, "Fate Stay with Me", which she sent to a local folk singer, Lindsay Morgan, who recruited Morissette as his protégé.

Morissette released "Fate Stay with Me" as a single via a label she founded with Morgan. A limited number of copies were pressed, and it received little airplay.

She was also a cast regular on the Nickelodeon Show You Can't Do That on Television

At a New York City audition, Morissette landed a spot on Star Search, a popular American talent competition on which she used the stage name of Alanis Nadine, her first and middle names. Morissette flew to Los Angeles to appear on the show, but lost after one round. In 1988, Morissette signed a publishing deal with MCA Publishing, which helped to fund her record deal with one of its independent subsidiary labels.

During her high school years, she attended Immaculata High School and Glebe Collegiate Institute in Ottawa.

Personal Life

During 1993, Morissette dated Dave Coulier of television's Full House fame.

Between the ages of fourteen to eighteen, Morissette suffered from anorexia and bulimia nervosa, which were catalysed by "hardcore" professional pressure and managerial demands from her work towards making her first album. She recalled returning to the studio to re-record some vocals, only to be told that the person who summoned her there wanted to discuss her weight, and that she couldn't be successful if she was fat. She lived on a diet of carrots, black coffee and Melba toast, and her weight fluctuated by fifteen to twenty pounds. She subsequently began therapy, which she called "a long process to un-program [my brain]. I try to remember, whatever my body is, it's perfect the way it is."

By mid 2004, Morissette had become an ordained minister with the Universal Life Church, a religious organization that offers anyone semi-immediate ordination as a minister free of charge.

In June, Morissette announced her engagement to actor, and fellow Canadian, Ryan Reynolds.

During that time, she gave an interview to the British newspaper The Mirror in which she discussed her past homosexual relationships, having dated a twenty-nine year-old man at age fourteen and, briefly, her experiences with drugs. In the article, she was quoted as saying: "My addictions were work and food. I smoked pot once in a while, but I'm too much of a control freak to be a drug person."

In February 2005, Morissette became a naturalized citizen of the United States while maintaining her Canadian citizenship. Morissette refers to herself as a Canadian-American.

In a Rolling Stone interview she revealed that she was going to spend 2006 working on a memoir. She said of her book, "it will be all the wisdom I've accrued in the thirty-one years of my life [...] A lot about relationships, fame, travel, body-image issues, spirit — with a lot of self-deprecating humor peppered throughout, 'cause I just can't help it."

In June 2006, People magazine reported that Morissette had split from her fiancé, Ryan Reynolds, but neither party confirmed the report.

The following month, a source said that they were together, Contact Music reported that their split was a "rumour",and they were pictured holding hands in Los Angeles.

In February 2007, representatives for Morissette and Reynolds announced that they had mutually decided to end their engagement.

In June 2008, when asked about some revealing songs on her new album, she responded, "I’ve had so many rock bottom moments in my life. I’ve hit rock bottom, but I didn’t necessarily bounce up as high right after. This one was the biggest bounce." 

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