One of the main stars on this season of Love & Hip Hop: New York is Bianca Bonnie, formerly known as Young B. But who is she?
Bianca was a supporting cast member on the VH-1 show in Season 6 but became a full-time cast member in Season 7. She is a singer-songwriter, as well as a dancer, rapper and an actress.
Despite being just 25, she has already been working in the music industry for ten years.
She first making a name for herself when she appeared alongside Webstar on his debut album Webstar Presents: Caught in the Web from 2006, along with the main single Chicken Noodle Soup featuring The Voice of Harlem — which has been watched more than 8million times on YouTube.
Her latest album is called The 9th Year, which she worked on with her new manager and LHHNY co-star Yandy Smith-Harris, who is also one of the reasons she’s made it big on the show. You can listen to some of her music on her Soundcloud.
Bianca has also done more work with Webstar in recent years, including featuring on his song Get This Work in 2015.
She has an ever-growing social media following with nearly 400,000 fans on her Instagram, 50,000 on Facebook and 7,000 on Twitter.
Bianca, born Bianca Dupree and who has also been known as BiBi and Bonnie Banks in the past, is from Harlem, New York City, and went to the city’s Essex Street Academy before studying at New York University.
In 2007, she won The Sprite Award for Best R&B/Soul or Rap Dance Cut at the Soul Train Music Awards for her work on Chicken Noodle Soup.
Last year she claimed former manager Arthur Smith was trying to extort her for a cut of her Love & Hip Hop: New York fee. It came after he threatened to sue the show’s host network VH-1 for 50 per cent of what she gets paid.
Love & Hip Hop: New York airs Mondays at 8/7c on VH-1.