Alessia Cara

Every kid who puts their music up on YouTube dreams of stardom, but R&B/pop singer Alessia Cara is one of the few who actually achieved it, ending up a multi-Platinum artist and Grammy winner. Born Alessia Caracciolo on July 12, 1996 in Ontario, Canada, she did indeed post clips on YouTube of herself performing other people's songs at the age of 13. But when she was just 18, Cara released her first single, "Here," which became a huge hit in the U.S., going to No. 5 and achieving triple Platinum status. Cara's 2015 debut album, Know-It-All, reached the U.S. Top 10 and went Platinum. The following year, Cara toured as an opening act for Coldplay. After racking up a couple more Platinum-selling singles from the album, Cara scored another hit with "How Far I'll Go," written by Lin-Manuel Miranda of Hamilton fame and featured in the animated Disney film "Moana" (2016). Her next big single was a non-LP cut as well - 2017's "Stay," a duet with producer/DJ Zedd that hit the U.S. Top 10. That same year, she made a guest appearance on the single "1-800-273-8255" by U.S. rapper Logic, which went Platinum five times over and reached No. 3. In 2018, Cara released her second album for Def Jam, The Pains of Growing.