Ed Sheeran (1991 - )

Edward Christopher "Ed" Sheeran (born 17 February 1991) is an English singer-songwriter and musician. He was born in Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire and raised inFramlingham, Suffolk. After dropping out of school at 16, he moved to London the following year, in 2008, to pursue a career in music. In early 2011, Sheeran independently released the extended play No. 5 Collaborations Project, which caught the attention of Elton John and Jamie Foxx. After signing with Asylum Records, his debut album, + (read as "plus"), was released on 9 September 2011 and has since been certified six-times platinum in the UK. The album contains the single "The A Team", which earned him the Ivor Novello Award for Best Song Musically and Lyrically.[4] In 2012, Sheeran won the Brit Awards for Best British Male Solo Artist and British Breakthrough Act.

Sheeran's popularity abroad began in 2012. In the US, he made a guest appearance on Taylor Swift's fourth studio album, Red.[6] "The A Team" was nominated for Song of the Year at the 2013 Grammy Awards, where he performed the song with Elton John. He spent much of 2013 opening for Swift's The Red Tour in North America dates. In late 2013, he performed three sold-out shows at New York's Madison Square Garden as a headline act. He was nominated for Best New Artist at the 2014 Grammy Awards.

His second studio album, x (read as "multiply"), was released worldwide on 23 June 2014. It peaked at number one in the UK and the US. In 2015, x was nominated for Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards, won the Brit Award for Album of the Year, and he received the Ivor Novello Award for Songwriter of the Year. As part of his world tour, Sheeran played three sold-out concerts at London's Wembley Stadium in July 2015, his biggest solo shows to date

Sheeran was born in Hebden Bridge, a market town in Calderdale near Halifax, West Yorkshire. He moved, with his family, to Framlingham, Suffolk as a child. He has an older brother named Matthew, who was born on 17 March 1989. Matthew studied music at university and is now a classical composer. Their parents, John and Imogen, are London-born. His paternal grandparents were Irish. According to Sheeran, his father hailed from "a very large" Catholic family. His paternal grandfather, Bill, was a Protestant and his wife, Ann, was Catholic.Bill and Ann retired in Gorey, County Wexford.
John is an art curator and lecturer, and Imogen is a culture publicist-turned-jewellery designer. His parents ran Sheeran Lock, an independent art consultancy, from 1990 to 2010. Their work usually took them to London, and spent their weekends travelling with their children. These trips were regular and the Sheerans played music while travelling. Sheeran's early childhood memories include listening to the records of Bob Dylan and Eric Clapton. According to Sheeran, the album that first introduced him to music was Van Morrison's Irish Heartbeat.
Sheeran sang in a local church choir from the age of four, learned to play the guitar at a very young age, and began writing songs while at Thomas Mills High School in Framlingham. When he was eleven, he went with his father to a Damien Rice show in Ireland. In addition to Rice, he has also cited The Beatles, Dylan, Nizlopi and Eminem as his biggest musical influences. He is a patron of the Youth Music Theatre UK and of Access to Music, where he studied Artist Development course. He was accepted at the National Youth Theatre in London as a teenage
Sheeran began recording music in 2005, and released independently his first collection of work, The Orange Room, an extended play (EP). He has been friends with fellow English singer Passenger since he was 15, with the two playing on the same gig in Cambridge. He moved to London in 2008, and began playing in small venues. In 2008, he auditioned for the ITV series Britannia High. He also opened for Nizlopi in Norwich in April 2008 after being one of their guitar technicians.  He released another EP in 2009, You Need Me, just before going on tour with Just Jack. He also did a few collaborations with Essex singer Leddra Chapman, including CeeLo Green's "Fuck You". In February 2010, Sheeran posted a video through SB.TV, and rapper Example invited Sheeran to tour with him. In the same month, he also released his critically acclaimed Loose Change EP, which featured his future debut single "The A Team".
In April 2010, Sheeran bought a ticket to Los Angeles, with no contacts other than one poetry night. He played open mic nights all over the city, before he was spotted at The Foxxhole by Jamie Foxx, who was so impressed that he offered Sheeran the use of his recording studio and the bed of his Hollywood home for the rest of his stay. Throughout 2010, Sheeran began to be seen by more people over the internet through YouTube and his fan-base grew, with him also getting credit from The Independent newspaper, England football captain Rio Ferdinand and Elton John. Sheeran also self-released two other EPs in 2010, Ed Sheeran: Live at the Bedford and Songs I Wrote with Amy, which is a collection of love songs he wrote in Wales with singer Amy Wadge.
On 8 January 2011, Sheeran released another independent EP, No. 5 Collaborations Project, featuring grime artists such as Wiley, Jme, Devlin, Sway and Ghetts.[38] With this EP, Sheeran gained mainstream attention for reaching number 2 in the iTunes chart without any promotion or label, selling over 7,000 copies in its first week. Three months later, Sheeran put on a free show to fans at the Barfly in Camden Town. Over 1,000 fans turned up, so Sheeran played four different shows to ensure everyone saw a gig, including a gig outside on the street after the venue had closed. Later that month, Sheeran was signed to Asylum Records.

2011–13: + and international success
Sheeran at Academy 1, Manchester Dot to Dot Festival, June 2011
On 26 April 2011, Sheeran appeared on the TV music show Later... with Jools Holland, where he performed his debut single "The A Team". Six weeks later, "The A Team" was released as a digital download in the UK. The release served as the lead single from Sheeran's debut studio album, entitled + (read as "plus"). "The A Team" entered the UK Singles Chart at number three, selling over 58,000 copies in the first week. It was the best selling debut single and the overall eighth-best selling single of 2011, selling 801,000 copies. The lead single also became a top ten hit in Australia, Germany, Ireland, Japan, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Norway and the Netherlands. During a headline set in the BBC Introducing tent at Glastonbury Festival 2011, Sheeran announced that "You Need Me, I Don't Need You" would be released on 26 August as the second single from the album. The second single peaked at number four on the UK Singles Chart. "Lego House" was released as the third single, reaching the top ten on Australian, Irish, Scottish, New Zealand Singles Charts, Flemish Ultratop 50 and the Wallonian Ultratip. "Drunk", released on 19 February 2012, became Sheeran's fourth consecutive top ten single in the UK, peaking at number nine.

Sheeran released + on 12 September 2011. The album received generally favourable reviews from music critics. + debuted number one on the UK Albums Chart for sales of 102,000 copies. By end of 2011, sales of the album in the UK stand at 791,000; it became the second best-selling debut and the ninth biggest-selling album there. The album has been certified platinum six times by the British Phonographic Industry, denoting shipments of 1,800,000 copies. As of March 2012, the album had sold 1,021,072 copies in the UK. The album also reached the top five in Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand and the US.