Kelly Clarkson Biography

After graduating from school she scraped together enough money to fund a trip to Hollywood to peruse her dreams of a career in music. Having briefly worked with songwriter Gerry Goffin, she become disillusioned with L.A life and returned to Texas where she found work as a cocktail waitress.

2002 saw the US debut of the hit reality series ‘American Idol’ and Kelly found herself encouraged by friends to join the thousands of other young hopefuls. Happily ensconced in the competition, it wasn’t long before Kelly, and more importantly her voice, came to the attentions of celebrity judges Paula Abdul, Simon Cowell and Randy Jackson.

Week by week contestants were whittled down until only Kelly and Justin Guarini remained. In September 2002, she picked up 58% of the final audience vote and was declared the winner of the first ever American Idol.

Her debut single taken from the series, ‘A Moment Like This’, broke records when it was released in October 2002 and her album ‘Thankful’ sold well in the US.

With success on home territory firmly in the bag, Kelly adopted a rockier sound for her follow-up release, ‘Breakaway’ in 2004. The album won 2 Grammy awards and featured the writing talents of Avril Lavigne. Thanks to the success of singles such as ‘Since U Been Gone’, the album has sold in excess of 5 million copies worldwide.

While on tour in Europe in 2006, Clarkson began writing and composing songs for her third album, My December. In 2007, she parted with her management company after a disagreement over the release dates of songs from the album. My December was officially released in the U.S. in June 2007 and has gone on to sell over 2.5 million copies worldwide.

She is currently working on a fourth album.