It takes a brave singer to try and do Adele, but 13-year-old French singer Marina Kaye showed she had more than enough soul in her to make “Rolling in the Deep” her own. The schoolgirl is a strikingly expressive and powerful singer who had the audience at France’s Got Incredible Talent on their feet by the time she hit the famous chorus.
Marina’s take on the Adele hit blew the judges away as well as music fans online, with her audition being viewed 80 million times on YouTube. Rather than trying to emulate Adele’s vocal mannerisms, Marina comfortably lends her own flavour to the song, and you can really see the passion in her eyes as she sings it, making for an eye-catching performance.
Unsurprisingly for such an enormous talent, Marina went on to win the sixth series of France’s Got Incredible Talent, as well as forging an original music career. The young singer, who was born on 9 February 1998 in Marseille, France, originally began her music career at age 10 by posting vocal covers on her YouTube channel.
Marina is quite the Adele fan, as later on France’s Got Incredible Talent, she sang the English popstar’s song “Set Fire to the Rain”, as well as Katy Perry’s “Firework”. You can see Marina perform “Set Fire to the Rain” in the video below, where she again brings her distinctive style to the number one hit song.
After Marina won the competition she, rather sadly, decided to exit the music industry due to bullying at her school. She later changed her mind after a meeting with Norwegian producer Jan Erik Frogg and she resumed singing and turned it into a full-time career. Frogg discovered the teen on YouTube from her cover of Demi Lovato’s “Skyscraper”, and the pair have continued working together to this day.
At age 15 Marina left school and moved to London, England to work on her music. Her first release as an original artist was the Homeless EP, which featured her debut single of the same name, which she co-wrote. The four-track EP, which showcased a pop and rock style, topped the charts in France and Belgium. It even became the fifth-highest charting release of the year in her homeland.
The young singer followed this up with three studio albums. Marina’s success on the French charts continued with these, with her debut studio album Fearless going x3 Platinum in France and the follow-up Explicit going Gold. Her third studio album Twisted reached the French top 50 and yielded the single “The Whole 9”, which peaked at #15 on the French charts.
Fearless remains her most popular album, as it again featured “Homeless” and other fan favourite tracks such as “Freeze You Out” and “Dancing With the Devil”. “Freeze You Out” is notable for having been written for Marina by Australian superstar Sia along with English songwriter Chris Braide. If you would like to see more from Marina Kaye, you can subscribe to her YouTube channel or follow her on Instagram.