Justin Drew Bieber is a Canadian singer and Grammy Award-winning artiste, and has been referred to as the ‘Prince of Pop’ and ‘King of Teen Pop’. Born on March 1, 1994, Bieber is a child prodigy raised by a single mother in Stratford, Ontario, Canada. From his childhood, he was interested in music. His mother gave him a drum kit for his second birthday and, as he tells it, he was “basically banging on everything I could get my hands on.” He learned to play the drums, the piano, the guitar, and the trumpet.
But it was an obscure talent contest in his hometown, in which the 12-year-old Bieber finished second that put him on the road to superstardom. In 2007, he participated in a local singing competition and his mother posted a video of his performance on YouTube for friends and family who were unable to attend. She later uploaded other homemade videos, in which Bieber sang popular rhythm-and-blues (R&B) songs and occasionally accompanied himself on acoustic guitar, and they soon attracted attention beyond their originally intended audience.
Among those who saw Bieber’s videos were Scott Braun, a music promoter and talent agent, who invited the 13-year-old Bieber to record demos at a studio in Atlanta. While there, Bieber happened to encounter R&B singer Usher and arranged an informal audition with him. Impressed by Bieber’s natural confidence and vocal talent, Usher helped sign him to a recording contract in late 2008.
In 2008, he gained recognition with the release of his debut seven-track EP My World and soon established himself as a teen idol. What Do You Mean went on to become a number-one hit in 18 different countries, and netted Bieber his first-ever number-one single on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in the US and the UK’s Official Single Chart. Justin Bieber went on to become the first solo artist to have four singles enter the Top 40 before the release of a debut album. His 2009 album, My World, went platinum in several countries. By this time his audience had dramatically expanded to include countless preadolescent girls who considered him a heartthrob, and the recording sold more than one million copies. Following the release of Changes in February 2020, the 25-year-old became the youngest artist to have seven albums reach the top spot on the Billboard Hot 200, breaking the record once held by a 26-year-old Elvis Presley. Wax statues of him with the hairstyle from his early career are on display at the Madame Tussauds wax museums in New York City, London, and Amsterdam.
As Bieber entered adulthood, his celebrity often overshadowed his music. His hits include ‘Let Me Love You’, ‘Despacito (Remix)’ and ‘I’m the One’. His 2015 album Purpose found an audience beyond his youthful fan base, with each of its first three singles reaching number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Also in 2015, Bieber contributed vocals to Jack Ü’s Grammy Award-winning electro-pop hit ‘Where Are Ü Now’. In 2018 Bieber married model Hailey Baldwin, and their relationship inspired his fifth studio album, Changes (2020). Throughout his career, Bieber has sold an estimated 150 million records worldwide as of 2019, making him one of the world’s best-selling music artists.