Amy Winehouse

Back to Black --- Stronger than Me --- Rehab. She was a member of the National Youth Jazz Orchestra and won the Ivor Novello Award for Best Contemporary Song. At the 50th Grammy Awards, she won five awards, becoming the first British woman to win five Grammys. She is ranked 26th on the VH1 list of 100 Greatest Women in Music. She was Amy Winehouse.

Born on the 14th September, 1983, at Chase Farm Hospital in Gordon Hill, to Jewish parents, Amy’s ancestors were Russian and Polish Jewish immigrants to London. Her father was Mitchell “Mitch” Winehouse and worked as a window panel installer and taxi driver. Her mother was Janis and worked as a pharmacist. Amy had an older brother, Alex, who was born in 1979. The family lived in Southgate, London, where Amy attended Osidge Primary School. As a child, she went to a Jewish Sunday School and used to go to the Synagogue once a year on ‘Yom Kippur’ “out of respect.”

Many of Amy’s uncles were professional jazz musicians and her grandmother, Cynthia, was a singer who dated the jazz saxophonist Ronnie Scott.Even her parents encouraged Amy’s interest in jazz. Her father would sing Frank Sinatra songs to Amy, and when she was sent to the headmistress’s office to be chastised at school, Amy would sing “Fly Me to the Moon.”

When Amy was nine years of age, her parents separated, with Amy living with her mother and visiting her father (and his new girlfriend) at weekends, at Hatfield Heath, Essex. Cynthia suggested Amy attend the Susi Earnshaw Theatre School, where she went, every Saturday, for four years. Amy improved her singing voice and learnt to tap dance. Here, Amy and her friend, Juliette Ashby, formed a rap group, “Sweet’n’Sour”. It was short-lived, however, when Amy went to full-time training at the Sylvia Young Theatre School. Amy also attended the Mount School, Mill Hill, and the BRIT School in Selhurst, Croydon.

At fourteen years of age, Amy bought her own guitar and began writing music. She began working as an entertainment journalist for the World Entertainment News Network and singing with a local group “The Bolsha Band.” Amy became the featured female vocalist with the National Youth jazz Orchestra in July, 2000, being influenced by Sarah Vaughan and Dinah Washington.

Tyler James, a soul singer and good friend, sent Amy’s demo tape to an A&R person, and in 2002, Amy signed to Simon Fuller’s 19 Management. She was paid £250 a week (against future earnings). All the time she was being ‘developed’, Amy was kept a recording industry secret. Amy still sang, regularly, at the Cobden Club. Darcus Beese heard of Amy by accident when listening to some productions. It took a while to find out that it was Amy WInehouse who was the key vocalist. Beese wanted to sign Amy, but she had already signed a deal with EMI and recorded a number of songs. During this time, Amy formed a working relationship with producer Salaam Remi.

Beese introduced Amy to his boss, Nick Gatfield, who wanted to sign Amy as a young artist. Both Beese and Gatfield were very enthusiastic over Amy. She signed up to “Island.” Amy now made her debut album “Frank” which was released in October, 2003. It was produced (mainly) by Salaam Remi with many of the songs being influenced by jazz. Apart from two covers, Amy co-wrote every song. The album was complimented on the “cool, critical gaze” of its lyrics. It went on to achieve platinum sales, with Amy’s voice being compared to Sarah Vaughan and Macy Gray.

“Back to Black” was starting to be promoted, and in early October, 2006, Amy’s official website was relaunched with a new payout and clips of previously unreleased songs. “Back to Back” was released in 2006, in the U.K. It went straight to number one in the U.K. Albums Chart! In the U.S.A., it entered at number seven on the Billboard 200. It sold 1.85 million copies over the year in the u.K., making it the best-selling album of 2007. “Rehab”, the single, reached the top ten in the U.K. and the U.S.A. “Time magazine named “Rehab” the Best Song of 2007.”The second single, “You Know I’m No Good”, reached number 18 on the U.K. singles chart.

Amy promoted “Back to Black” with performances in 2006. Bruce Willis introduced Amy before her performance of “Rehab” at the 2007 MTV Movie Awards in Universal City, California, in June, 2007. This same year, she performed at Glastonbury Festival and Lollapalooza in Chicago.

In February, 2008, Amy received five Grammy Awards, earning her an entry into the 2009 edition of the Guinness Book of Records for the ‘most Grammy Awards won by a British Female act.’ Over the next few years, Amy continued to perform in several countries, even performing for Nelson Mandela’s 90th Birthday Party Concert, London, 2008.

Towards the end of her young life, Amy’s concert performances were mired with her forgetting lyrics, being extremely tired and “tipsy.” Her last performance was to support her goddaughter, Dionne Bromfield, who was singing “Mama Said” with “The Wanted.” Three days later, Amy died on 23rd July, 2011, of alcohol poisoning.

Again we see such a beautiful and talented young woman destroy her life with drugs and drink. It seemed that Amy could not cope with her own brilliance and needed the two to escape. For me personally, Amy Winehouse and her music will always stand out in history, as so many young people could relate to the lyrics she wrote. We had her for a very short time but Amy’s music will go on forever!