Charmaine Clarice Relucio Pempengco (born May 10, 1992), popularly known by the mononym Charice, is a Filipino recording artist and actress who rose to popularity through YouTube. Dubbed by Oprah Winfrey as the Most Talented Girl in the World,[1] she released her first international studio album Charice in 2010. The album entered the Billboard 200 at number-eight, making Charice the first Asian singer in history to land in the Top 10 of the Billboard 200 albums chart.
She released the single "Pyramid" which featured singer Iyaz. It became her most successful single to-date, charting within the top 40 in a number of countries, and debuting on The Oprah Winfrey Show where she sang live vocals. Crossing over to acting on television, she joined the cast of TV series Glee as Sunshine Corazon. She has released a new lead single, "Before It Explodes", written by Bruno Mars, from her international sophomore studio album, Infinity.
Pempengco was born in Laguna, Philippines. After barely escaping her violent father, Charice was raised by her single mother, Raquel. To help support her family she began to enter singing contests at age seven, from town fiestas in various provinces to singing competitions on TV. She is said to have competed in almost a hundred such contests.
In 2005 Charice joined Little Big Star, a talent show in the Philippines loosely patterned after American Idol. Eliminated after her first performance, she was called back as a wildcard contender and eventually became one of the finalists. Although she was a consistent top scorer in the final rounds, she did not win the title in the finale and only placed third.
Charice made minor appearances on local television shows and commercials, but essentially fell off the radar after her stint at Little Big Star. It was not until 2007 that she gained worldwide recognition after an avid supporter under the username FalseVoice, started posting a series of her performance videos on YouTube. These videos received over 15 million hits.
On January 23, 2010, she appeared on Io Canto, a renowned singing competition in Italy. She performed her standards plus an Italian favorite called "Adagio" (made popular by Lara Fabian), in Italian. On January 31 she was featured as one of the musical acts on the NBC Sports program Silk Soy Milk Skate for the Heart, a show designed to raise awareness of heart disease. She performed "Note to God" and debuted two new songs included in her debut album, "In This Song" and "Breathe Out" (later retitled as "Breathe You Out"). The album version and club remixes of her second single, "Pyramid" (featuring Iyaz), from her international debut album were released on February 23, 2010 and March 2, 2010. Her self-titled international debut album with Reprise Records was released on May 11, 2010. On its first week, the album reached #8 on the Billboard 200 Album Chart, making her the first Asian to enter the Top 10.[disputed – discuss] On the same day as part of her album launching, she again made a guest appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show along with another YouTube-discovered singer Justin Bieber. Pempengco's world-wide promotion of her album was shown in a 12-part mini-documentary entitled 30 Days with Charice, which was filmed by Alloy TV and published at Teen.com. On June 22, Pempengco herself confirmed that she will join the cast of the hit US television series Glee on its second season. Later in the week, she released a promotional single entitled "Crescent Moon" in Japan. The single is an English rendition of the Japanese song "Mikazuki" by Ayaka.
During the inauguration of Philippine President Benigno Aquino III on June 30, 2010, Charice sang the Philippine national anthem in front of a crowd estimated at more than half a million. In July she embarked on an album promotional tour of Asia covering Thailand, the Philippines, Japan and South Korea. While in South Korea, she appeared on the show Star King for the third time. On September 7 the premiere of Glee's second season was held in Hollywood with Pempengco in attendance. Cast in a recurring role, she plays an exchange student from the Philippines named Sunshine Corazon who presents serious competition against lead character Rachel Berry (played by Lea Michele). On November 30 she appeared on NBC's Christmas in Rockefeller Center and performed two songs from her Christmas EP, "Grown-Up Christmas List" and "Jingle Bell Rock", with producer and mentor David Foster. She also performed "The Prayer" with the Canadian Tenors and David Foster on the piano for a Christmas special on CBC Television. In December she became Operation Smile's official Smile Ambassador. She joins other celebrity Smile Ambassadors such as Jessica Simpson, Billy Bush, and Zachary Levi in the organization's global efforts of providing free surgeries to children born with cleft lip, cleft palate and other facial deformities. On February 13, 2011, her very first television musical special entitled Charice: Home for Valentine's was broadcasted on Philippine television's GMA 7 network. From February 21 to February 25, she embarked on her very first solo tour performing in four shows held at three different Zepp music halls in Japan (Nagoya, two Tokyo dates, and Osaka).
It was announced that she began to record new material for her upcoming sophomore international album. "Before It Explodes", her comeback single, written by Bruno Mars, was released on April 18, 2011. The following day after its release, another song, titled "One Day", was released on iTunes, which was co-written and co-produced by Nick Jonas. "Louder", the second single was released on May 20 which was bundled with another song, "Lost The Best Thing". On September 14, 2011, it was revealed in a Japanese broadcast that she will be singing the theme song to the video game Final Fantasy XIII-2, titled "New World".
Her second studio album, Infinity, was released exclusively early in Japan on October 5, 2011.
In an ABC News interview, David Foster mentioned that she has the ability to mimic other people's voices, which, according to him, is a characteristic of good singers. In a separate interview, Josh Groban stated that Charice's voice is one of the most beautiful voices he has heard in a long time. The New York Post once called her a vocal prodigy for being able to sing 'big songs' even at her tender age. Ryan Murphy, the executive music producer of the hit US television series Glee, said, "When that girl opens her mouth, angels fly out." Charice was recently featured in Oprah's bookazine, “Oprah’s Farewell Celebration: Inside 25 Extraordinary Years of ‘The Oprah Winfrey Show,” and is mentioned to have a "soaring soprano voice" and a "5-octave" voice. Charice released a new web series "30 Days With Charice", in early 2011 and on its 3rd episode, entitled "Charice On The Road : NYC" her manager Marc Johnston said of Charice's remarkable talent and extraordinary voice, "Vocally, she's probably the greatest female pop singer in the world right now...what other great vocalists are out there that can do what she's doing?". The highest note that Charice has sung in chest voice in a live performance would be a G#5 in the song "One Moment In Time" in 2009, when Charice was only 17. Her vocal range would be generally classified as a mezzo soprano, but when in her upper register, her voice is classified as a "dramatic soprano". Her videos and songs on youtube now have over 300 million views altogether.
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