George Michael

Background

George Michael, born Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou, made a massive impact on the music industry throughout the 1980s, and his music still lives on today. Michael was born on June 25, 1963, in East Finchley, North London. His music career started in 1981, at the young age of 18 years old, with his schoolmate Andrew Ridgeley. The two friends attended the same school as teenagers in Radlett — a village in England — and shared the dreams of becoming musicians. Following their dreams, the duo started Wham!, which became one of the greatest bands of all time since the release of their first album.

The pop duo released their first album in 1983 called “Fantastic” and their second album a year later called “Make It Big.” Both albums successfully reached number one on the U.K. Albums Chart and made the U.S. Billboard 200. Their hit singles were ‘Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go,’ which was inspired by a letter that Ridgeley wrote to his parents, and ‘Last Christmas.’

In 1985, Wham! Toured China for the first time, making them the first artists to perform Western music in the country. Michael, however, began doing solo singles outside of Wham! and released his first solo, ‘Careless Whisper,’ in 1984. Although the song was sung by Michael alone, the single was added to the duo’s second album “Make It Big.”

Michael received his first Ivor Novello Award for ‘Songwriter of the Year’ in 1985. Before releasing his first solo album, he released a duet with Aretha Franklin, ‘I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me),’ in 1987 and a solo single, ‘A Different Corner,’ in 1986. A year before the release of his solo album, Michael and Ridgeley performed their last song together before separating, called ‘The Edge of Heaven’ in 1986, and in 1987, Michael released his solo album, “Faith,” which topped the U.K. Albums Chart and was number one on the Billboard 200 for 12 consecutive weeks.

His album sold over 20 million copies and won the ‘Album of the Year’ award in 1989. Michael’s second album, “Listen Without Prejudice Vol.1” was released in 1990 and sold eight million copies worldwide. Michael shared that the name of this album was inspired by his desire to be taken more seriously as a songwriter. His second and third albums, “Older” (1996) and “Patience” (2004) were also multimillion-selling albums. In 2004, Michael’s documentary “George Michael: A Different Story” was released and told the story of his personal and career life. In 2008, Michael made an acting debut and appeared in “Eli Stone”— a television series — as the guardian angel of Jonny Lee Miller’s character.

During his music career, the legendary artist sold over 120 million records worldwide, performed various concerts, won multiple awards, and was named the most played artist on British radio between the years 1984 to 2004. Michael performed the last concert of his life in 2012 at the Earls Court’ in London. On December 25, 2016, the world woke up to the news of Michael’s death. The star was found by his lover, Fadi Fawaz, in his home in Goring-on-Thames, Oxfordshire.