Gabriella Cilmi

Gabriella Cilmi, a singer-songwriter originally from Melbourne but now calling the U.K. home, delivers vocals steeped in a husky, whiskey-like timbre that masks her youth while channeling a defiant rock edge that fast-tracked her ascent in pop circles. She came into the world on October 10, 1991, in Dandenong on Melbourne’s outskirts in Australia and studied at Sacred Heart Girls’ College near Oakleigh; after being turned away from a high-school musical audition and informed she had insufficient discipline for singing, she responded by launching a garage band and cutting a demo. Her pivotal moment arrived when she leapt onstage at a Melbourne street gathering for a spontaneous take on the Rolling Stones’ “Jumping Jack Flash,” drawing notice from a leading local record producer. Still only 13, she was promptly brought to London, where she inked a contract with Island Records and started sessions with the Xenomania production collective under the direction of eccentric pop specialist Brian Higgins and his longtime associate Miranda Cooper. Her striking debut single, “Sweet About Me,” appeared early in 2008 and was followed weeks later by the album Lessons to Be Learned.