Sonia Marina Clarke (born 21 June 1965), better known by her stage name Sonique, is a British singer, musician and DJ. She came to public attention as a member of dance band

S'Express S'Express (pronounced ''ess-express''; sometimes spelled S'Xpress or S-Express) were a British dance music act from the late 1980s, who had one of the earliest commercial successes in the acid house genre. "Theme from S'Express", which containe ...

during the early 1990s, but achieved greater success as a solo artist in the early-to mid 2000s. During this period she achieved UK top 20 hits with " It Feels So Good", " Sky", "

I Put a Spell on You "I Put a Spell on You" is a 1956 song written and composed by Jalacy "Screamin' Jay" Hawkins, whose own recording of it was selected as one of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. It was also included in Robert ...

" and " Can't Make Up My Mind", and won the 2001

BRIT Award The BRIT Awards (often simply called the BRITs) are the British Phonographic Industry's annual popular music awards. The name was originally a shortened form of "British", "Britain", or "Britannia" (in the early days the awards were sponsored ...

for British female solo artist.

Biography

1965–1983: Early life

Sonia Clarke was born and raised in

Crouch End Crouch End is an area of North London, approximately from the City of London in the western half of the borough of Haringey. It is within the Hornsey postal district (N8). It has been described by the BBC as one of "a new breed of urban villag ...

to parents of

Trinidadian Trinidadians and Tobagonians, colloquially known as Trinis or Trinbagonians, are the people who are identified with the country of Trinidad and Tobago. The country is home to people of many different national, ethnic and religious origins. As a ...

descent. The first record she ever purchased was Donna Summer's "

I Feel Love "I Feel Love" is a song by American singer and songwriter Donna Summer. Produced and co-written by Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte, it was recorded for Summer's fifth studio album, ''I Remember Yesterday'' (1977). The album concept was to have ...

". When Sonique was sixteen her mother remarried and moved back to Trinidad. She refused to move with her mother and two siblings and instead stayed in London, moving into the

YMCA YMCA, sometimes regionally called the Y, is a worldwide youth organization based in Geneva, Switzerland, with more than 64 million beneficiaries in 120 countries. It was founded on 6 June 1844 by George Williams (philanthropist), Georg ...

1983–1991: Early music career

At the age of seventeen, a youth worker commented that she had a nice voice and suggested she use it. She put together a

reggae Reggae () is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1960s. The term also denotes the modern popular music of Jamaica and its diaspora. A 1968 single by Toots and the Maytals, " Do the Reggay" was the first popular song to use ...

band called 'Fari', in which she ended up writing all the music. After Fari disbanded she set about getting a recording contract. Sonique released the single "Let Me Hold You", published by

Cooltempo Cooltempo, the dance music imprint of Chrysalis Records, was revived in May 2018. The label released albums by artists such as Kenny Thomas, Milli Vanilli, Adeva, Shara Nelson, Mica Paris and Innocence. History Cooltempo emerged at the end ...

, in 1985. The single hit the

Top 40 In the music industry, the Top 40 is the current, 40 most-popular songs in a particular genre. It is the best-selling or most frequently broadcast popular music. Record charts have traditionally consisted of a total of 40 songs. "Top 40" or "cont ...

on the

UK Dance Chart The UK Dance Singles Chart and the UK Dance Albums Chart are music charts compiled in the United Kingdom by the Official Charts Company from sales of songs in the dance music genre (e.g. house, trance, drum and bass, garage, synthpop) in record s ...

. In 1990, she was credited for the track "Zombie Mantra", which was included on the album '' Set the Controls for the Heart of the Bass'', the debut record of

William Orbit William Mark Wainwright (born 15 December 1956),"William Orbit." ''Contemporary Musicians''. Vol. 30. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale, 2000. Retrieved via ''Biography in Context'' database, 7 May 2017. Available onlinvia ''Encyclopedia.com'' known ...

's project

Bass-O-Matic In cryptography, BassOmatic is the symmetric-key cipher designed by Phil Zimmermann as part of his email encryption software PGP (in the first release, version 1.0). Comments in the source code indicate that he had been designing the cipher sin ...

. Soon after, she teamed again with DJ

Mark Moore Mark Moore (born 12 January 1965) is a British dance music record producer and DJ. He was founder of the dance / sampling pioneers S'Express, and runs the London nightclubs, 'Electrogogo' and 'Can Can'. Biography Moore began his DJ career ...

, a few years after providing vocals for

. The dance-pop duo charted in the

UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...

with singles such as " Nothing to Lose". She maintained a friendship with Mark Moore after S'Express disbanded and, shortly afterwards, he gave her the gift of a set of turntables and a mixer with which she began experimenting.

1997–2001: DJ career

For three years she accompanied both Mark Moore and her childhood friend Judge Jules to their gigs. She eventually signed to London-based label Serious Records, where her first single was "

" produced by Chris Allen and ex-Wang Chung keyboardist Graeme Pleeth. She was DJ-in-residence at Club Manumission in Ibiza between 1997 and 1999. In 1998, she came to the attention of UK promoters/label Fantazia and was asked to mix one of the discs on their album '' Fantazia British Anthems Summertime''. The album was certified

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...

in the UK. Sonique released her debut solo album '' Hear My Cry'' in 1998. Re-released in 2000, the album's hit single " It Feels So Good" topped the UK chart for three weeks in May/June of that year. After 14 weeks in the Top 40, it became the UK's third best-selling single of 2000. In 2001, after the success of "It Feels So Good" she announced that she planned to retire from the world of DJing to focus on her singing career. After finishing the album '' Born to Be Free'', Sonique did return to DJing on a few special occasions.

2002–2006: ''On Kosmo''

In 2004, Sonique announced she was working on a new album called '' On Kosmo''. The first single was "Another World", which reached number 57 in Germany when released in 2004. " Why" (released Spring 2005), reached number 90 in Germany. "Alone" was selected as the third single with which the album would be launched, but when the album got pushed back from the expected release date of February 2006, the single was cancelled. When the new release date of 29 September 2006 was announced, the track "Sleezy" was chosen as the single with which the album was to be released. However, "Sleezy" was also cancelled when the release date was pushed back once again. When ''On Kosmo'' was finally released, on Monday 13 November 2006, it failed to chart significantly in the UK. Nevertheless, Sonique was shown as a celebrity guest at 2006 edition of the

World Music Awards The World Music Awards is an international award show founded in 1989 under the patronage of Albert II, Prince of Monaco and co-founder/executive producer John Martinotti. The event is based in Monte Carlo. Awards are presented to the world' ...

, in London.

2009–present

In 2007, when promotional work for her previous album, ''On Kosmo'', was finished, Sonique announced she would continue touring Europe despite the flop of the album. A teaser from some of the new material she had been working on, entitled "Better Than That", 'leaked' online on 5 October 2008. Due to the positive reception of this 'leak', the track was posted available to download on various legal

MP3 MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany, with support from other digital scientists in the United States and elsewhere. Origin ...

download sites. She was diagnosed with

breast cancer Breast cancer is cancer that develops from breast tissue. Signs of breast cancer may include a lump in the breast, a change in breast shape, dimpling of the skin, milk rejection, fluid coming from the nipple, a newly inverted nipple, or a r ...

in June 2009, for which she underwent surgery at a London clinic. Following her operations, Sonique opted to receive 5 months of

chemotherapy Chemotherapy (often abbreviated to chemo and sometimes CTX or CTx) is a type of cancer treatment that uses one or more anti-cancer drugs ( chemotherapeutic agents or alkylating agents) as part of a standardized chemotherapy regimen. Chemothe ...

in an effort to prevent a recurrence. She was given the all clear in 2010 and celebrated by appearing on a cover version of the

Cyndi Lauper Cynthia Ann Stephanie Lauper Thornton (born June 22, 1953) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and activist. Her career has spanned over 40 years. Her album ''She's So Unusual'' (1983) was the first debut album by a female artist to achi ...

song ''

Girls Just Want To Have Fun "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" is a song written, recorded and performed by American musician Robert Hazard, who released it as a single in 1979. It is best known for the version of American singer Cyndi Lauper, who covered the song in 1983. I ...

'' which was released to raise funds for the

Cancer Research UK Cancer Research UK (CRUK) is the world's largest independent cancer research organization. It is registered as a charity in the United Kingdom and Isle of Man, and was formed on 4 February 2002 by the merger of The Cancer Research Campaign and t ...

charity. The single "World of Change" was released on 23 October 2009 and the official video was posted by Sonique's label on

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

. The year 2011 brought the release of the album ''Sweet Vibrations'', which contains the previously released singles "Better Than That" and "World of Change".

Discography

Albums

Singles

Notes

*A "I Put a Spell on You" peaked at number 36 in the United Kingdom upon its original release in 1998; it was later re-released in 2001, and served as the third single from ''Hear My Cry'' in all other territories. *B "It Feels So Good" peaked at number 24 in the United Kingdom upon its original release in 1998; it was later re-released in 2000, and served as the first single from ''Hear My Cry'' in all other territories.

Awards and nominations

{, class=wikitable , - ! Year !! Awards !! Work !! Category !! Result !! Ref. , - , rowspan=8, 2000 , rowspan=4,

MTV Europe Music Awards The MTV Europe Music Awards (originally named MTV European Music Awards, commonly abbreviated as MTV EMA) are awards presented by Paramount International Networks to honour artists and music in pop culture. It was originally conceived as an a ...

, " It Feels So Good" , Best Song , , rowspan=4, , - , rowspan=5, Herself , Best New Act , , - , Best Dance , , - , Best UK & Ireland Act , , - ,

NME Awards The ''NME'' Awards is an annual music awards show in the United Kingdom, founded by the music magazine '' NME'' (''New Musical Express''). The first awards show was held in 1953 as the ''NME'' Poll Winners Concerts, shortly after the founding ...

, Best Dance Act , , , - , rowspan=2,

Smash Hits Poll Winners Party The Smash Hits Poll Winners Party was a British awards ceremony which ran from 1979 (as the Smash Hits Readers' Poll) to 2005. Each award winner was voted by readers of the '' Smash Hits'' magazine. It ended with the closure of the magazine in F ...

, Best Dance/Soul Act , , , - , rowspan=5, " It Feels So Good" , Best Dance Choon , , , - , The Record of the Year , Record of the Year , , - , rowspan=10, 2001 , BMI Pop Awards , Award-Winning Song , , , - , rowspan=2,

Ivor Novello Awards The Ivor Novello Awards, named after the entertainer Ivor Novello, are awards for songwriting and composing. They have been presented annually in London by the Ivors Academy (formerly the BASCA) since 1956, and over 1,000 statuettes have been a ...

, International Hit of the Year , , - , Best Selling UK Single , , - , Hungarian Music Awards , '' Hear My Cry'' , Best Foreign Dance Album , , - ,

International Dance Music Awards The International Dance Music Awards or IDMAs is an annual awards ceremony held in Miami Beach, Florida, United States as a major part of the Winter Music Conference. The awards have been held every year since the conference's creation in 1985 e ...

, rowspan=4, Herself , Best New Dance Artist Solo , , - , DanceStar Awards , DanceStar of the Year , , - , rowspan=4,

Brit Awards The BRIT Awards (often simply called the BRITs) are the British Phonographic Industry's annual popular music awards. The name was originally a shortened form of "British", "Britain", or "Britannia" (in the early days the awards were sponsored ...

, British Female Solo Artist , , rowspan=4, , - , British Dance Act , , - , rowspan=2, " It Feels So Good" , British Single of the Year , , - ,

British Video of the Year The Brit Award for British Video of the Year was an award given by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI), an organisation which represents record companies and artists in the United Kingdom. The accolade is presented at the Brit Awards, an annua ...

References

External links

Official site

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Sonique 1965 births 20th-century Black British women singers 21st-century Black British women singers Brit Award winners Club DJs English dance musicians English electronic musicians English house musicians English people of Trinidad and Tobago descent English women DJs English women in electronic music Electronic dance music DJs Living people People from Crouch End Republic Records artists Singers from London Universal Music Group artists ZYX Music artists