Music world in mourning for Whitney Houston ahead of Grammys

Feb 12, 2012, 16:05 GMT

Los Angeles - The music world was in mourning Sunday for pop diva Whitney Houston, who died under mysterious circumstances in a Los Angeles hotel on the eve of the annual Grammy Awards.

Police were called to the Beverley Hilton hotel on Saturday afternoon local time and found the 48-year-old singer unresponsive.

She was pronounced dead 30 minutes later, after hotel security and rescue officials failed to resuscitate her.

The death of the six-Grammy winner, who had battled with drug addiction, was to cast a dark shadow over the 54th edition of the music awards later Sunday. Houston had planned to attend the ceremony.

'It's so stunning and unbelievable. I couldn't believe what I was reading coming across the TV screen,' tweeted soul legend Aretha Franklin, who was also Houston's godmother.

'She will never be forgotten as one of the greatest voices to ever grace the earth,' singer Mariah Carey tweeted.

Country singer Dolly Parton, who wrote I Will Always Love You, Houston's greatest hit, said she would 'always be grateful and in awe of the wonderful performance she did on my song.'

'I can truly say from the bottom of my heart, 'Whitney, I will always love you. You will be missed',' she said in a statement.

Grammy executive producer Ken Ehrlich said her death would be acutely felt at the Staples Center, where singer Jennifer Hudson will lead a tribute.

'We're really in shock ... She was such a part of our family. It's tough and it's going to reverberate through this hall, on the show extensively,' Ehrlich told the BBC.

Police, meanwhile, were busy investigating the cause of Houston's death.

US celebrity news website TMZ quoted unnamed staff members at the Beverly Hilton as saying Houston and a group of friends partied late at the hotel bar on Friday night and were 'drinking and very loud.'

Talkshow host Larry King recalled her first impression on meeting her as being 'Wow' and said it was 'sad, sad, sad' that someone so young and so talented should die.

Houston was also honoured in Europe, where French Culture Minister Frederic Mitterand paid tribute to 'one of the great voices of American music.'

Houston was a superstar in the mid 1980s and well into the 1990s.

I Will Always Love You was the theme song to the film The Bodyguard, in which she starred opposite Kevin Costner as a singer who falls in love with the guard appointed to protect her from mysterious death threats.

That song and other hits, such as I Wanna Dance With Somebody, became the theme songs to a generation held in thrall by her ability to hit the highest notes.

Houston had one child with ex-husband Bobby Brown.

According to her website, Houston sold more than 170 million combined album, singles and videos worldwide.

She grew up in Newark, New Jersey. Her mother Cissy Houston was a gospel singer and her cousin was music great Dionne Warwick.