Stromae

Stromae (Paul Van Haver) was born on March 12, 1985, in Brussels, Belgium, and grew up in the small district of Laeken. 

His parents, and especially his father, were quite successful people. Pierre Rutare (father of Stromae) was an architect and has already gained local recognition. Unfortunately, he died in 1994 during the horrific genocide in Rwanda, where his family lived. Of course, this left a serious scar on the boy's soul. Because of this tragedy, all the upbringing of children fell on the shoulders of his mother, Miranda Van Haver. 

Although the young Paul Van Haver had been interested in music since childhood, he began to pay more and more attention to it at school, where he even formed a small group with his friends. Together they created small songs in the Hip-Hop genre and even performed in front of some people. This fascination and other factors negatively affected the boy's education, and he later failed the school system. 

He soon decided to take music more seriously and pay more and more attention to it. As before, his main genre was hip-hop. In order to enter the music scene with a new name, he chose the pseudonym Opmaestro, from which he will change to Stromae in the future. Together with another rapper J.E.D.I., he tried to create a band, or rather a duo, but after only one song, the duo broke up. As Van Haver continued his training efforts, money was required. To do this, he got a job in hospitality service, where he worked for some time. That was enough to join later INRACI or the National Institute of Radioelectricity and Cinematography. While studying at this institute, he continued to develop as a musician actively and even released his first EP, entitled "Juste un cerveau, un flow, un fond et un mic..." (Just a brain, a flow, a background, and a mic ...). 

To Van Haver's surprise, people liked the songs from this EP, and some record labels even started asking him to work together. Among them was "Because Music", with which he signed a contract for 4 years. Although he still loved hip-hop, in addition to him, Stromae found a new genre that completely conquered him. It was Eurodance. This dance music had bright elements from the music of the '80s and combined a variety of genres, from hip-hop to techno. Very soon after the artist found this genre, he tried himself in it, and as you know, it became one of the best decisions on the way to a career as a singer. 

The first song that Stromae showed his love for Eurodance was "Alors on danse", released in 2010. No one expected this, but even influential people in the music industry were delighted with this single. Of course, it just could not help but attract even more attention, and very soon, everyone learned about him. This excitement helped to spread the song with incredible speed, and a month after the release of "Alors on danse”, it became a hit #1 in Belgium and later in most of Europe. Well-known American rapper and producer Kanye West also liked this track, and he invited Stromae to make a joint remix, which was released in the fall of that year. 

Of course, the Awards Shows simply could not miss such an artist, which is why Stromae was nominated for the MTV Europe Music Awards, Victories de la musique, and others. After that, he began accelerating work on his debut album called "Cheese". The album contained 11 songs + 1 remix on "Alors on danse", which was also included. After the album's release, will.i.am from Black Eyed Piece offered to create a mix of songs "Alors on danse" and "Don't Stop The Party". 

Almost immediately after he released his first album, Stromae began work on a second album called "Racine carrée". The first song from this album that he presented to the public was "Papaoutai", which is still considered one of his best songs. The music video for this song has already had more than 815 million views on the official YouTube channel Stromae. 

"Papaoutai" is a very personal song because it tells the story of a guy who stopped seeing his father. Of course, this strongly intersects with the childhood story of Stromae himself and thus even more clinging to the soul. The second single he presented to the public was "Formidable". Like "Papaoutai", it became a hit, although it had a completely different meaning. This song was a simple story of a drunken boy who split up with his girlfriend. 

It took him about a year to complete the album, and in the fall of 2013, the release of "Racine carrée" took place. Already in the first week of the album's release, it became a financial success. Of course, you can't miss the song "Tous Les Mêmes", which became wildly popular on a par with "Papaoutai" and "Formidable". The music video for this song received more than 310 million views. 

Beginning in 2014, Stromae began to appear significantly less in public and even stopped releasing new songs. The first notable event that confirmed people's concerns occurred in 2015 when he was forced to cancel the tour in some African countries due to panic attacks. As it turned out, these panic attacks were caused by malaria medicine. In 2015, Stromae had the biggest health problems, which temporarily stopped him from doing music. 

The album "Racine carrée" is the last one he has released to date, but Stromae has not stopped making music all these years. He continued to help other musicians as a producer. One example of such work was the music video for Dua Lipa's song "IDGAF", where he worked with Henry Scholfield on its production. In 2019, the vocals of Stromae can be heard in the song of the band Coldplay "Arabesque". In 2020, he held a live stream on his Instagram, where he shared his plans for the future and said that we probably should expect a new album in the future.