At the tender age of 14, Ed Sheeran began recording music and independently released his first collection of songs “The Orange Room EP”. It was after his move to London in 2008, though, that his music career really began to take off due to the release of his “Loose Change EP”, which featured future megahit single “The A Team”.
Prepared to graft from the very start, Ed Sheeran played 312 gigs in 2009 in addition to constantly releasing new material on his YouTube channel. These gigs and his widespread social media following caught the attention of Jamie Foxx, Elton John and Example. Further to this, his hard work won thousands of fans, who would show up at any small gigs he was playing. Knowing they were on to a good thing, Asylum/Atlantic Records quickly signed Ed Sheeran to their label after the release of his popular “No. 5 Collaborations Project” EP.
Ed Sheeran’s debut studio album “+” entered at number one in the UK charts after Ed secured four top ten singles in a row from the album. An opportunity to break into the US market soon came about after Ed was given the opportunity to tour with the band Snow Patrol.
Licensing of his music to television shows, and collaborations with One Direction on their song “Moments” and with Taylor Swift on the song “Everything Has Changed” paved the way for Ed Sheeran’s second studio album “x” (pronounced ‘multiply’) to hit the number one position in both the UK and the US charts.
Despite being so early in his career, Ed has already been nominated for three Grammy Awards and was the recipient of a 2012 Ivor Novello Award for “The A Team”. With these successes under his belt, Ed Sheeran’s star can only continue to rise.
It takes a lot of talent to make grown men squeal like teenage girls at a concert but Ed Sheeran did just that. From the second he walks on stage the energy in the room changes. From first sight of that ginger hair the entire crowd went insane. The relation between the venue size and the amount of noise that was being produced was astounding. However, his cool presence can also make an entire room go silent. It takes true talent to quiet a room of teenage girls. On the other hand, the audience that his music appeals to was various. Although I arrived at 7:30 am for the general admission show (which started at 7pm) there were also many older fans and an almost even ration of male to female. You can tell by his expressions ( and the countless "thank-you's) that Ed is truly grateful to be where he is today. The way he gets the crowd involved is unbelievable. He has them sing the back up vocals while he plays the loop pedal and sings lead. This one man can create the sounds of an entire band. At various times throughout the show I stopped singing along just to hear his amazing voice and take in what was actually happening in front of my eyes. Closing the show with his latest hit "Sing", he left the crowd singing all the way into their cars. Never have I seen such a genuine performer with such talent. X.