16
TEEN People
The Road to Fame
Tassa Riscossa/Taxe Perçue
She is known simply as Adele, but her real name is Adele Laurie Blue Adkins. She was born in London on 5th May 1988 and is a singer songwriter. She puts her success down to the fact that she has been listening to great soul* and jazz singers, like Ella Fitzgerald and Etta James, since she was a child. She left school in 2006 and went to study at the UK’s ‘Fame Academy’, the BRIT School in Croydon (Amy Winehouse and Kate Nash also studied there). While still at school she put some of her songs onto Myspace. It was the first step towards her dream of becoming a pop star.
Newspapers, the radio and TV soon began to talk about Adele even though she hadn’t yet released any of her music officially. They praised her very individual and instantly recognisable voice. She appeared on a number of British chat shows and her fame grew rapidly. She signed a recording contract when she was 18 and was awarded the prestigious Critics Choice at the Brit Awards (other winners include Ellie Goulding and Florence and the Machine). Then she was awarded a Grammy Award for Best New Artist. It was in the following year, 2009, that she released her first single Chasing Pavements, followed soon after by her album called simply 19, – the age Adele was when she recorded the album
passives
“21” Adele’s second album has been as big a success as her first. Her songs talk of love and disappointment, friendship and the complex emotions of a girl of her age. Young people love her because her songs are about the things they care about, older people love her music because with her rich, soulful voice, she sounds like one of the great soul singers of the past. When Rolling Stone Magazine (a US-
based magazine devoted to music, politics and popular culture) had a picture of her on its front cover, she knew she had arrived right at the top of the music world.
The Adele Phenomenon You have to go all the way back to the Beatles in the Sixties to find anyone else who has had four records in the UK charts at the same time (Adele has had two albums and two hit singles in the charts at the same time). She is known as the Diva of Soul of the new millennium. She has sold millions of records, and has pushed artists like Britney Spears and Justin Bieber out of the charts. She has a lot of famous fans too, Jay Z, Kayne West and Lady Gaga who called her ‘simply wonderful’.
A girl like any other Adele says she is just a normal girl and is proud to be a little overweight, so
unlike many of pop divas of today. She keeps her feet firmly on the ground and tries to lead as normal a life as possible. She says: I love Lady Gaga and Katy Perry, but my music isn’t anything like theirs. I don’t write music to look at, I write music to be listened to. I hate going to the gym and I love good food!” Adele is shy and she admits, “I am always terrified before going on stage and I feel quite uncomfortable having so many adoring fans. Beyoncé once saw me shaking with nerves before a concert and she said to me, ‘Oh you shouldn’t be afraid, you have the voice of an angel!’ I really couldn’t believe she said that.”
Glossary charts: list of best-selling songs and albums gone to her head: become arrogant released: published (for music) soul: type of music with roots in Black America
Teen n. 7 - 2011 - Poste Italiane S.P.A. - Sped. in abb. post. - D.L. 353/2003 (Conv. in L. 27/02/2004 n. 46) Art. 1, comma 1, DCB - Ancona
Who is Adele
Adele
Adele is one of the most talented young stars of the music world. She is only 22 years old, but she has dominated the British charts* since she released* her first songs three years. Fortunately, all this success doesn’t seem to have gone to her head*. Let’s find out a bit more about Adele and what makes her music so special.