Aretha Franklin

Most influential would definitely be Mariah. Every relatively successful female singer that came after her has cited her as their biggest if not one of the biggest inspirations either musically or vocally, closely followed by Whitney. Most legendary black artist though would probably be MJ, closely followed by Mariah, then Aretha, then Whitney, then Stevie imo.

USA: Aretha Franklin
WW: Whitney but Beyonce when she dies.

Because the first set are the local legends. They came from a time period before the world wasn't so interconnected. Even America was split on racial issues + all the wars of the 1900s.

Mariah and Whitney kind of transcended that and with the album BOOM of the 80s / 90s and tracking sales becoming more accurate and the world become increasingly interconnected, it's easy to make an argument for them. Janet is still local and Mary's even more local since she's far more urban.

I would say Beyonce & Rihanna are part of a 4th (or even 5th) period of popular artist, where being World Wide is kind of a given.

Mariah brought so much to popmusic so its gotta be her

Diana Ross

So why did all the women from the first set manage to tour and perform worldwide....? And Anita isn't even from that generation. She's from the Whitney generation.

Janet has sold more records internationally than she has domestically. Where do you get "local" from?

Out of all those artists, Mariah is last.