Jackie Evancho

Between 2008 and 2010, Evancho entered talent competitions, sang the US national anthem at a Pittsburgh Pirates baseball game, issued her first album, Prelude to a Dream, and attracted interest on YouTube. In 2010, at the age of ten, she gained wide notice with her 2nd-place finish in the fifth season of America's Got Talent. With the 2010 holiday release of her O Holy Night EP, Evancho became the best-selling debut artist of 2010, the youngest top-10 debut artist in US history and the youngest solo artist ever to go platinum in the US. In 2011, her first full-length album, Dream with Me, debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 chart, and she became the youngest top-5 debut artist in UK history. Billboard ranked Evancho the top Classical Albums Artist of 2011. Later that year, Evancho released a full-length holiday album, Heavenly Christmas, and became the youngest person ever to give a solo concert at Lincoln Center in New York City as part of her first concert tour.


In 2012, Evancho released Songs from the Silver Screen, her third top-10 album debut. In 2013 she headlined benefit concerts at Carnegie Hall and elsewhere. She also appeared in the 2012 Robert Redford film The Company You Keep. Later album releases include Awakening (2014), Someday at Christmas (2016), Two Hearts (2017), The Debut (2019, her eighth consecutive release to reach No. 1 on the US classical albums chart)^[4] and Carousel of Time (2022). In 2017, Evancho performed the US national anthem at the presidential inauguration of Donald Trump and became the youngest person ever to perform a concert series at Café Carlyle. She has given concert tours in support of each of her studio albums. Evancho appeared in 2020 as a contestant on The Masked Singer.

Family and early life[edit]

Evancho was born on April 9, 2000,^[5][6] in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to Lisa and Michael Evancho.^[7] Her father operated a video security business until 2010.^[8] She has an older sister Juliet,^[9][10] a younger brother Zachary, and a younger sister Rachel.^[11] She was raised in a suburb of Pittsburgh^[12] in a Catholic family.^[8][13] Evancho began her education in the Pine-Richland School District,^[14] but at various times, after her career began, she received online schooling.^[15][16] She attended Pine-Richland High School,^[17][18] graduating in 2018.^[19]


After Evancho saw the film version of the musical The Phantom of the Opera as a young girl,^[15][20] she began singing the songs at home.^[21][22] Her parents did not recognize that her voice was unusual until her first talent competition, which she entered just before her eighth birthday,^[23] In the competition, Kean Idol,^[24] placing second.^[21][25] She began taking voice lessons^[24][26][27] and singing at events,^[28] churches and nursing homes, mostly in Pennsylvania.^[29][30] She also started a YouTube channel,^[31] sang in the Children's Festival Chorus of Pittsburgh (now Pittsburgh Youth Chorus) during its 2008–09 season,^[25][32] and performed the title role in a 2009 school musical version of Little Red Riding Hood.^[14]


In 2009, Evancho competed at the 15th annual USA World Showcase Talent Competition in Las Vegas, where she placed second.^[12][30][33] At the 2009 Kean Idol contest, she was again runner-up.^[24][34][35] In other 2009 talent contests,^[36] she won the Golden Ribby Award – WonderworldTV^[32] and the Talent Quest TV Show (both in Massachusetts).^[37][38] Also in 2009, she sang "Ave Maria" in composer and conductor Tim Janis's PBS television special "Celebrate America"^[35][31] and performed in other concerts and TV shows with Janis,^[39] who sought her out after seeing her on YouTube.^[33][31] She made various singing appearances around Pennsylvania in 2009 and 2010, including singing The Star-Spangled Banner at the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball team's 2010 home opener.^[29][40]