Emeli Sande Biography

Adele Emily Sande is a Scottish singer and songwriter. She is famous for her two top hits, Read All About It with Professor Green and Beneath Your Beautiful, with Labrinth. Her debut album, Our Version of Events was best-selling album in the UK, in 2012. Furthermore, she won 3 Brit Awards.

Early Life & Career

Emeli Sande was born in Sunderland, in 1987, but she moved to Scotland with her family at the age of four. She was always passionate about music, having written her first song when she was eleven and wanted to pursue songwriting professionally. Later, she added, “I never thought it was an option to sing anyone else’s songs”. The shy and nerdy 15-year old Sande began singing gospel music. She postponed music for college and thus, studied medicine, getting a degree in neuroscience. Emeli found inspiration in Frida Kahlo, whom she admired for her bravery.

She started her music career by playing gigs, where she distributed her first independent album, Have You Heard?. Shortly after, her parents submitted a CD to BBC Radio and Emeli got to collaborated with Ras Kwame. Moreover, Emeli met producer Naughty Boy before eventually signing with Virgin and EMI Records. In 2009, the R&B singer made her debut by featuring on Chipmunk’s Diamonds Rings, which she also wrote.

Our Version of Events & Long Live the Angels

In 2011, after months of speculation, Emeli released her debut single, Heaven, to positive reactions. Most noteworthy, she topped the UK singles charts for the first time with Read All About It and won her first Brit Award. In early 2012, the album Our Version Of Events came out and reached number 1 on the UK albums chart. Critics called it a collection of “richly melodic, classically powerful, retro-futurist soul-pop songs”. Emeli performed at the 2012 Olympics the Christian hymn Abide with Me and her single Heaven. She also sang John Lennon’s Imagine for BBC’s montage of the Olympics.

In the summer of 2013, she toured with Naughty Boy and performed 2 songs with him. Before the released of her second album, Emeli had a strong presence in many humanitarian campaigns. She is also one face of Fashion Targets Breast Cancer in the effort to also create awareness and funding. Additionally, in 2014 she joined the charity group Band Aid 30. Her second album, Long Live The Angels, came out in late 2016. It peaked at number 2 on the UK charts and spawned the single Hurts.

Photo source: Discogs