Adele

Adele Laurie Blue Adkins, born on 5 May 1988 in the London district of Tottenham, England, better known by her stage name Adele [əˈdɛl], is a British singer-songwriter. In 2008, she released her first album, titled 19, which has sold more than 8.5 million copies. She was the first artist to receive the Brit Awards Critics' Choice prize. She was voted by a panel of music critics as the best emerging artist of the BBC's Sound of 2008. In 2009, Adele won two awards at the 51st Grammy Awards, Best New Artist and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.

In 2011, she released her second album, titled 21. Adele won six Grammy Awards at the 54th ceremony, becoming the second woman to achieve such a feat. In 2012, she performed the theme song for the film Skyfall, which won her a Golden Globe and an Oscar in the Best Original Song category. In February 2013, she won the Grammy Award for Best Pop Solo Performance for Set Fire to the Rain. In 2014, the album had sold 1.74 million copies in France. 21 holds the record for the best-performing album in the history of the US charts, having topped the Billboard 200 for 24 weeks. 21 became the best-selling album of the decade and went on to sell more than 31 million copies worldwide. It is the best-selling album of the 21st century, both in the United Kingdom and worldwide.

Her third album, 25, was released in 2015. It topped record sales in numerous countries and was the first album to sell more than three million copies in a single week in the United States. Adele also became the artist with the most record sales worldwide in 2015 thanks to this album. In February 2017, she was the big winner at the Grammy Awards, taking home five trophies from five nominations (Album of the Year, Song of the Year, Record of the Year, Best Pop Solo Performance and Best Pop Vocal Album). In 2016, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry named Adele the world's most popular recording artist for 2015. In 2016, she was the second highest-paid female singer in the world. She is the richest celebrity under the age of thirty in the United Kingdom. 25 has sold more than 22 million copies worldwide. Her fourth album, 30, released in November 2021, was the best-selling album in the world that year and won the Brit Award 2022 for British Album of the Year.

With more than 120 million records sold worldwide, Adele is among the best-selling artists of all time. She is the best-selling female artist in the United Kingdom of the 21st century and the best-selling artist in the United States of the 2010s. In 2011, The Guardian named Adele the most powerful and influential person in the music industry. In 2012, she was ranked fifth in VH1's '100 Greatest Women in Music'. Time magazine named her one of the most influential people in the world in 2012, 2016 and 2022. At the 2012 and 2016 Ivor Novello Awards, Adele was named Songwriter of the Year by the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors. In 2013, she was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) for services to music in the Queen's Birthday Honours.