Beyoncé Giselle Knowles

• 2010–present: New management, 4 and motherhood
In January 2010, Knowles was interviewed by USA Today and announced plans to take a break from music in 2010. She stated: "It's definitely time to take a break, to recharge my batteries. ... I'd like to take about six months and not go into the studio. I need to just live life, to be inspired by things again." During this time, a 60 Minutes segment aired, that revealed Knowles was homeschooled as a child and prays before every live performance. In February 2010, Knowles was featured on Lady Gaga's single "Telephone". The single reached number one on the US Pop Songs chart, thus becoming the sixth number-one on the chart for both Knowles and Lady Gaga. With this, they both tied with Mariah Carey for most number-ones since the Nielsen BDS-based Top 40 airplay chart launched in 1992. "Telephone" received a Grammy nomination for Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals at the 53rd Grammy Awards. In June 2010, Forbes placed Knowles at number three on its list of "Top-Earning Musicians" with $87 million in grosses for her 93-date world tour, deals with Nintendo and L'Oréal and her House of Deréon clothing line. This made her the world's best paid female artist for this span of time. In October 2010, Forbes recognized Knowles as the ninth "Most Powerful Woman in the World". She was also ranked at ninth place on Forbes' list of "Hollywood's 20 Highest Earners of 2010", becoming the only artist to break the top ten.
In January 2011, it was announced that Knowles would appear in a remake of A Star Is Born, to be directed and produced by Clint Eastwood for Warner Bros.. The remake will be the fourth telling of the A Star Is Born tale, the most memorable in recent years being the 1976 version with Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson. In February 2011, documents obtained by the WikiLeaks website revealed that Knowles along with Usher, Mariah Carey and Nelly Furtado had received as much as $1 million to perform for family members of Libyan politician Muammar Gaddafi. Rolling Stone magazine reported that the music industry was urging them to return the money they earned for the concerts. On March 2, 2011, a spokesperson for Knowles told The Huffington Post that she had donated the money to the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, established to aid the victims of the 2010 Haiti earthquake. On March 28, 2011, it was announced that Knowles' father and longtime manager Mathew Knowles would no longer manage her career. Knowles' publicist released a statement to The Associated Press revealing that Knowles and her father have split "on a business level." She now manages herself and has hired her own management team. In June 2011, Forbes placed Knowles eighth on its list of "Best-Paid Celebrities Under 30" for earning $35 million between the months of May 2010 and 2011. Forbes noted that the low placement for Knowles was due to the fact she spent most of the past year off the road and recording her then upcoming fourth studio album.
Knowles' fourth studio album 4 was released on June 24, 2011. The album was inspired by several musicians, including Fela Kuti, The Stylistics, Lauryn Hill, Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson. It debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, with first-week sales of 310,000 copies. This gave Knowles her fourth consecutive number one album in the US, and makes her the second female artist and third artist overall, to have her first four studio albums debut atop the Billboard 200. However, 4's first-week sales served as Knowles' lowest sales start with a studio album to date. Its lead single "Run the World (Girls)" peaked at number 29 on the Billboard Hot 100, and became Knowles' lowest charting lead single as a solo artist. The album's second single "Best Thing I Never Had" was released on June 1, 2011. It peaked at number 16 on the Billboard Hot 100. Knowles headlined at the 2011 Glastonbury Festival, performing a 90-minute set on the last day of the festival on June 26, 2011. She also performed at the T in the Park Festival in Scotland on July 9, 2011 and the Oxegen Festival in Ireland the next day. Knowles took the stage at New York's Roseland Ballroom for four nights of special performances. The set on each night of the 4 Intimate Nights with Beyoncé concerts was the entire collection of 4. For these four special nights, August 14, 16, 18 and 19, she performed her new songs to a standing room only audience.