On My Terms

EMILY SANDÉ, 30, talks about an eye-opening family trip to Zambia, the collapse of her marriage and latest album.

- Dan Cairns

Late in 2013, more than two years into promoting her multi-platinum debut album, Our Version of Events, Emeli Sandé took to the stage at a venue in north London for yet another headline show. It was clear to many of those present that something wasn’t quite right. Technically, her performance was proficient, as you’d expect from someone blessed with such a huge voice and a reputation for professionalism. But it all seemed too mechanical and worryingly detached. She looked, well, lost. Emeli’s memory of that night is vivid. te House. Plus marriage. Then divorce. “These two fans in the audience sent me a note: ‘Are you okay? If you need to talk about anything, we’re here.’ I’d lost so much weight. I read it in the taxi home and thought, ‘Wow. Nobody around me has said this to me, and these two people who’ve come to the show can speak to me on that level.’ And that’s when

I knew I had to rethink everything.” The 30-year-old says this as she shows us round Alford, the small Aberdeen shire town in the UK where she grew up with her Zambian father, English mother and younger sister, Lucy. It’s a world away from the situation she found herself in once her debut single, Heaven, gave her her first solo hit in mid-2011. That breakthrough ushered in a period of colossal success (and upheaval) in Emeli’s life: three Brit awards, the best-selling British album of 2012, constant tours, performing at the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2012 Olympics, singing for the Obamas at the White House. Plus marriage. Then divorce.