Entertainment
Charlotte Church reveals her fans believed she had ‘divine power’: ‘One guy claimed I cured his cancer’
Charlotte Church has revealed fans believed she was an ‘actual angel’ (Picture: ITV)
Charlotte Church has revealed that some of her fans believed she was an ‘actual angel’ following the release of her first album Voice Of An Angel in 1998, when she was just a child.
The Welsh singer-songwriter, who rose to fame as an 11-year-old operatic singer in 1997 before finding later success as a pop star, spoke on Kate Garraway’s Life Stories about her struggles growing up in the spotlight.
She told Kate in the episode, which airs on Thursday: ‘People often would say that I was an actual angel.
‘And you know, this is particularly in religious America and stuff where people really thought that I had some sort of, you know, divine power.’
The Masked Singer runner-up, now 35, even recalled a moment during the early years of her career, when a man backstage at a concert in New York told her that listening to her music had cured his brain cancer.
‘I remember having fans at signings and stuff who would be shaking from head to toe to meet me, and that was weird.
‘And there was another guy backstage at a show in New York, who was absolutely convinced I’d cured his brain cancer through listening to my music.
‘It’s like, you know, I doubt it happened. But he was absolutely convinced. So I was like, “fair enough babes”.’
Charlotte admitted she was forced to ‘cut the ties’ with her younger self at age 16 (Picture: ITV)
Rising to fame as a young child, Charlotte explained how difficult it was growing up and trying to live up to the public’s image of her as pure and angelic.
She told Kate: ‘All of the normal ways in which we grow and how puberty happens and how girls become women, was stifled and such.
‘I felt I had to be this other eternally young, innocent, you know, little girl and that’s not where literally biological life was taking me.’
Charlotte rose to fame as an 11-year-old operatic singer, with fans falling for her angelic look and voice (Picture: NBCUniversal/Getty Images)
Sony UK President Paul Berger (centre) with Charlotte Church. Charlotte wowed fans and signed a five-album contract with Sony, London in 1998 (Picture: Mark Baker/Sony Music Archive via Getty Images)
At the age of 16, having spent half a decade in the spotlight, Charlotte was forced to ‘cut the ties’ with her younger self, and her family, to try to experience a normal adolescence.
‘You’ve got to remember and put me in my context, which is like an impressionable young girl and who’s trying to fit in.
The Welsh singer-songwriter rose to fame at the age of 11 (Picture: ITV)
‘So no, there was definitely no conscious rebellion. The only thing I rebelled against was celebrity.
‘My rebellion was: I will be normal.
More: Kate Garraway
‘I will have this life that I’m supposed to have this life of Charlotte and Cardiff with her friends.
‘This whole showbiz nonsense, which is a facade. This isn’t my life,” she confirmed.
Kate Garraway’s Life Stories featuring Charlotte Church airs tonight, February 17 at 9pm on ITV and ITV Hub.
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