Brooke Fraser
Template:Infobox musical artist 2
Brooke Gabrielle Fraser (born December 15, 1983 in Wellington, New Zealand) is an award-winning New Zealand singer-songwriter.
Early life
Brooke is the eldest of the three children born to former All Black Bernie Fraser and his wife Lynda. Brooke grew up in Naenae, Lower Hutt and attended Dyer Street School then Naenae Intermediate and Naenae College.
Brooke started taking piano lessons at seven years of age, continuing until seventeen. She started writing songs at age twelve and taught herself the acoustic guitar at sixteen.
She received some label interest when she was fifteen, but instead preferred to focus on getting an A bursary, a school leaver's award. She nevertheless performed at Parachute, an annual Christian music festival, and has continued to do so each year since 2000.
Brooke was a presenter on a cable television show. She began writing for the Soul Purpose Magazine at age fifteen and was later made editor in 2002. She gave up her job as editor shortly after moving to Auckland (late 2002) in order to pursue her music career.
Record deal
In 2002 while Brooke was in Auckland Scotty, the drummer for Elemenop, organized a meeting with producer Matty J for her. Matty J became her manager, shopped her around the major labels and compared their offers. Brooke had about 5 different labels offering her deals and in late 2002 she ended up signing a multi-album deal with Sony Music Entertainment New Zealand.
Success
Brooke's first album What To Do With Daylight was released in late 2003, debuting at #1 and achieved gold-selling status in the same week. The album eventually went 7 times platinum, selling over 100,000 copies in New Zealand alone. She remained on the album charts for a record 66 weeks [1]. All five singles from her album reached the top 20 RIANZ charts, the official singles chart of New Zealand. Her album was the second best selling NZ album of 2004 (behind Hayley Westenra's Pure which went 11 times platinum).
Her second album Albertine sees her working with many musicians in the United States, who have links to Gwen Stefani, Rufus Wainwright, Alanis Morrisette among others [2]. Albertine has already gone 2 x Platinum in less than 1 month.
Charity Work
Brooke was used throughout 2005 as the public face of World Vision in New Zealand. She visited Rwanda in June and appealed for people to donate. She will release a song in late 2006 called Albertine. This song was inspired by her time in Rwanda [3].
Discography
Albums
| Album | Statistics | Singles |
|---|---|---|
|
What To Do With Daylight
|
Singles Released
|
|
Albertine
|
Singles Released
|
Singles
| Year | Title | Album | Chart positions | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| NZ | AUS | ||||||||||
| 2003 | "Better" | What To Do With Daylight | 3 | - | |||||||
| 2004 | "Lifeline" | What To Do With Daylight | 7 | 56 | |||||||
| 2004 | "Saving The World" | What To Do With Daylight | 15 | - | |||||||
| 2004 | "Arithmetic" | What To Do With Daylight | 8 | - | |||||||
| 2004 | "Without You" | What To Do With Daylight | 16 | - | |||||||
| 2006 | "Distant Sun" | She Will Have Her Way | - | - | |||||||
| 2006 | "None But Jesus" | United We Stand | - | - | |||||||
| 2006 | "Deciphering Me" | Albertine | 4* | ||||||||
- *Still currently charting
Featured appearances
The group have appeared on some compilations since breaking onto the music scene in New Zealand. The following is a list of these albums that have featured tracks by the Brooke Fraser.
- (2003) - Now That's What I Call Music 13 (EMI) - Better
- (2004) - Now That's What I Call Music 14 (EMI) - Lifeline
- (2004) - Now That's What I Call Music 15 (EMI) - Saving The World
- (2004) - Now That's What I Call Music 16 (EMI) - Arithmetic
- (2004) - Triumph: New Zealand Music Supports The Breast Cancer Research Trust (EMI) - Lifeline
- (2005) - She Will Have Her Way (EMI) - Distant Sun
- (2005) - Top Of The Pops 2005 (EMI) - Saving The World
- (2006) - More Nature (Sony BMG) - Arithmetic
Awards
- Most promising Woman Musician Award & Overall winner, 1999 Hutt Valley Pepsi Smokefree Rockquest regional finals
- Best Female Solo Artist: What To Do With Daylight - 2004 NZ Music Awards
- Breakthrough Artist of the Year: What To Do With Daylight - 2004 NZ Music Awards
- 'Better' - most performed work on NZ radio in the last 12 months - Silver Scroll Awards (2004)
Brooke was also awarded a satirical award:
- The most used fairy lights in a video clip (for Arithmetic) - Studio 2 Awards (2004)