Adele
A voice that cut across generations, singing of loss and love without a filter.
At a glance 🔭💭
Some coordinates adapted from GeoNames (CC BY 4.0) · Pleiades (CC BY 3.0)
The people alongside ⏳🌊
- FamilyPenny Adkins
The mother who raised Adele alone, filling a childhood with all kinds of music.
- InfluenceEtta James
The singer who showed young Adele the archetype of the soul voice.
- InfluenceAmy Winehouse
An older BRIT School alumna whose unaffected love of Black music left a lasting mark.
- ColleagueJonathan Dickins
Her manager since her debut, who helped shape her entire career.
- ColleaguePaul Epworth
The producer behind “21” and “Skyfall.”
- FriendshipTaylor Swift
A fellow singer, and for many years a public champion of her music, as she has been of hers.
I. A girl from London · 1988–2004
(Birth) She was born in May 1988 in Tottenham, London, as Adele Laurie Blue Adkins. Her mother, Penny Adkins, was eighteen when she gave birth to her, and her Welsh father, Mark Evans, did not stay long by her side as young Adele grew up. Adele later spoke candidly about her relationship with her father in many interviews, and the two reconciled after she reached adulthood. Her father died in May 2021. (Mother) Penny raised Adele on her own, moving between West Norwood, Brixton and other parts of south London. A lover of the arts, she played all kinds of music for her daughter, and it was there that Adele first encountered the voices of Etta James and Ella Fitzgerald. (Talent) Young Adele grew up humming songs around the house and would often sing in front of her schoolmates. She had no formal musical training to speak of, but by imitating the soul and jazz vocalists she heard on the radio and on her mother's records, she honed a voice all her own.
II. The BRIT School and debut · 2004–2008
(BRIT School) In 2004 she enrolled at the BRIT School in Croydon, which teaches popular music and the performing arts. Amy Winehouse had attended the same school a few years earlier, and Adele later said she learned a great deal from the way Winehouse showed the world her love of Black music so naturally. Among her classmates was Jessie J, who would go on to become a pop star. (MySpace) She posted three songs she had made for a school assignment on MySpace, and as word of the demo spread, it caught the attention of record labels. In 2006, at eighteen, she signed with the independent label XL Recordings. (Jonathan Dickins) This was also the start of her long partnership with manager Jonathan Dickins. Dickins would remain a partner Adele trusted for nearly twenty years, helping set the pace and direction of her entire career. (19) In 2008 she released her debut album, “19.” The title came from her age when she wrote the songs, and the album gathered songs that worked through the pain of heartbreak in the idioms of soul and jazz. It was a major success in Britain, and the following year she won the Grammy for Best New Artist, making her name in America as well.
The signature single from her debut album “19,” it portrays the heart that keeps chasing someone even after the breakup.
- The piano and strings of the opening begin quietly, then swell broadly in the chorus.
- A voice that tells its story calmly in the low register pushes upward one note at a time in the chorus, building the emotion.
- Late in the song, backing vocals stacked layer upon layer (layering) fill out the thickness of the sound.
- In the bridge, brass and strings grow together, bringing the song's emotion to its peak.
III. 21 and the summit · 2008–2012
(Heartbreak) When a brief, intense romance with someone she met after the release of “19” came to an end, Adele poured that sense of loss into her second album. She never revealed who it was, but the feelings of that breakup ran through the entire record. (Collaborators) Working with a range of producers, including Paul Epworth, Rick Rubin and Ryan Tedder, she broadened her sound. “Rolling in the Deep,” made with Epworth in particular, melted the energy of soul and rock into pop, showing that Adele's music went beyond the simple ballad. (21) In 2011 she released the album “21.” “Someone Like You” and “Rolling in the Deep” became worldwide favorites one after another, and the album was the year's best-selling record in many countries. At the 2012 Grammys she won six awards, including the major categories. (Vocal cords) During the tour she sensed something wrong with her voice, and an examination found a hemorrhage on her vocal cords. Adele announced this herself, canceled the remaining dates and underwent surgery in 2011. The recovery period became a time that made her protect her voice and rethink her approach to singing. (Skyfall) In 2012 she wrote the theme song for the 007 film “Skyfall” with Paul Epworth. The song won the Academy Award for Best Original Song, earning her recognition not only as a pop star but as a film composer as well.
Made with Paul Epworth, this song melted the energy of soul and rock into pop and revealed the identity of “21.”
- The acoustic guitar riff and handclap rhythm of the opening erase the line between soul and rock.
- Just before the chorus, a rough, raspy vocal attack sharply raises the song's temperature.
- Drums hitting hard on the second and fourth beats (backbeat) firmly anchor the whole song.
- From the middle of the song onward, choral backing vocals pile up layer upon layer, creating the fullness of a choir singing along.
- Singing this song at the 2012 Grammy Awards, she marked her first major live return after vocal cord surgery.
Built on a single piano, this song is the plainest expression of the loss at the heart of “21.”
- Over an accompaniment of a single piano, every faint tremor of the voice is laid bare.
- With no showy technique, she conveys emotion simply by holding a single note long.
- Near the end, the moments when the voice teeters as if about to crack sound all the more like real emotion.
- Her near-unaccompanied live performance at the 2011 BRIT Awards is still counted among her defining moments.
As the theme for a 007 film, it confirmed her ability as a film composer beyond being a ballad singer.
- While keeping the brass-and-strings scoring characteristic of the 007 series, the voice asserts a classic presence above it.
- Starting low and widening its range toward the chorus, the structure creates a dramatic arc worthy of a film theme.
- In the final section, a tutti with the full strings (orchestration) brings the song to a grand close.
- Performing it live at the 2013 Academy Awards, she completed the moment of winning the Oscar for Best Original Song.
IV. Marriage and 25 · 2012–2016
(Family) In 2011 she met the philanthropist Simon Konecki, and the following year she gave birth to a son. For several years after the child was born, Adele scaled back her career dramatically and devoted herself to home. (Hiatus) During this period she stepped back from the glare of fame. Becoming a mother herself shaped the way she approached writing her next album; looking back on those years, she later said she had felt like a very different person from who she had been before. (25) In 2015, after four years away, she returned with the album 25. Made with Greg Kurstin, Max Martin, Danger Mouse and others, the record dwelt on longing for time gone by and for her own former self. The lead single, "Hello," went straight to number one on charts in country after country, and with it Adele confirmed once again that she stood at the summit as a ballad singer. (Influence) Billie Eilish is known to have been influenced by Adele's music, an anecdote that shows the mark Adele's voice has left on the singers of the generation that followed.
The lead single from 25, released after a four-year hiatus, the song is like a belated attempt to speak to time and relationships gone by.
- The piano chord progression of the introduction alone sets the mood of the entire song.
- The passages in the chorus where the voice is pushed out at full power (belting) form the song's climax.
- Greg Kurstin's minimalist arrangement keeps other sounds to a bare minimum, drawing all attention to the voice.
- Like the image of the old telephone in the music video, the whole song sounds like a belated attempt to speak to a relationship that has passed.
V. Divorce and 30 · 2017–2021
(Divorce) In 2019 she separated from Konecki, and the divorce was finalized in 2021. In many later interviews, Adele said she spent this period in long stretches of therapy and self-reflection. (30) In 2021 she released the album 30. Working again with Greg Kurstin, Inflo and others, she sang with quiet composure about divorce, her guilt as a mother, and the process of finding herself again. The advance single, "Easy On Me," hit number one on charts around the world the moment it came out. (Oprah) Ahead of the album's release, she appeared in a special broadcast with Oprah Winfrey, speaking in her own words about the divorce and her life afterward. Her willingness to talk openly about her private life was confirmed once more.
The advance single from 30, a song of divorce and of forgiving oneself, which swept the world's charts the moment it was released.
- The restrained, piano-led arrangement feels like a return to the idiom of the "Someone Like You" era.
- In the chorus the voice opens up, louder and rawer by degrees, lifting the song's emotion higher and higher.
- The moment in the bridge where the voice drops low, as if pausing for breath, before bursting out again is the song's turning point.
- The production, made with Greg Kurstin, refuses ornate embellishment and puts the voice itself front and center.
VI. Las Vegas and now · 2022–2026
(Residency) In 2022 she was set to open a Las Vegas residency, Weekends with Adele, but postponed the entire run just one day before opening night, citing a lack of preparation, and apologized to her fans directly. When the shows resumed ten months later, they were warmly received and ran through 2024. (Friendship) During this time Adele spoke on many occasions about her long friendship with Taylor Swift. The two have publicly cheered each other's music for years. (Now) With the close of the Las Vegas residency, Adele announced an indefinite break from music and said she had no plans for new material for the time being. Her relationship with the sports agent Rich Paul is public, and she still lives between London and Los Angeles.
Lesser-known stories
Her MySpace demo did not reach the world by her own design. She had posted three songs, recorded for a school assignment, so that her friends could listen to them; one friend sent the link to someone in the record business, and that led to a contract with XL Recordings. In many interviews since, Adele has reflected that she only ever wanted to make songs, never to become a star. "Someone Like You" was finished over two days of work with the producer Dan Wilson. The two sat at a single piano for hours, improvising melodies and progressions together, and by the end of that day's session most of the song's skeleton was in place. Neither of them, Wilson later recalled, imagined at the time that it would become the most beloved song on the album. Adele is known to dislike heavy retouching of her appearance in magazine photo shoots. This is said to reflect her wish to be judged by her voice rather than her looks.
Notes on terms 📚🔎
Melisma
(Etymology) Melisma comes from a Greek word meaning song or tune. (In pop) A singing technique in which a single syllable of lyric is drawn out across many notes in a winding line. Soul and R&B vocalists often use it when raising the emotion to its peak; picture a single short word rolled through note after note.
Belting
(In pop) A singing technique in which the resonant chest voice is pushed, at full power, all the way up into the high notes. It is rather like throwing your throat wide open to call to a friend on the far side of a playing field.
Bridge
(Etymology) The word is simply the English bridge. (In pop) A section in which a song, after alternating verse and chorus, shifts to an unfamiliar melody or point of view to breathe fresh air into the piece. Think of it as the part that gives the song's flow a single twist, like a digression in the middle of a story. (Elsewhere) In architecture, a bridge is a span crossing a river or road; in card games, it is the name of a particular game.
Power ballad
(In pop) A ballad that begins slowly and erupts, big and impassioned, in the chorus. Like a speech that opens quietly and ends with the voice raised, its emotion builds as it goes.
Backbeat
(Etymology) In English, backbeat means the beat that comes behind. (In pop) A style of drumming in 4/4 time that hits the second and fourth beats with special emphasis. The second and fourth beats you naturally stress when clapping along are exactly the feel of a backbeat.
Hook
(Etymology) In English, hook means a fishhook. (In pop) A short melody or lyric phrase that catches in the ear after a single hearing. Just as a fishhook snags a fish and pulls it in, a hook seizes the listener's ear and holds it fast. (Elsewhere) In fishing it is an actual fishhook; in boxing it is the hook punch, thrown from the side with a bent arm.