Che’Nelle, born in Malaysia and relocated to Australia at age 10, was raised in an environment where music and singing without notice of genre boundaries was a daily feature of home life. Her father, a civil engineer and architect, loved the classic pop balladeers of the Sixties, and her mother brought home every kind of rhythmic dance music, singing her daughter to sleep with her favourite new R&B and reggae songs.

As every child does, Che’Nelle charmed her parents with her singing, but she also amused and astonished her father in his karaoke lounge when she ignored the flashing lyrics to improvise her own, and invented her own words so that she could sing him songs shed heard just that day in a video.

“I was so young I didn’t even remember it until he told me that recently,” she laughs. “He said he knew it wasn’t how the songs went, but then he noticed that the words made sense. Maybe that’s where my lyric writing began, subconsciously!”

Already a hit songwriter in her home country of Australia, where she opened for Kanye West’s 2006 Australian tour, Che’Nelle, signed her first recording deal in America with Virgin Records at age 23 when she was discovered by club DJ and radio vet Sir Charles Dixon.

She completed her Capitol Records debut album -- almost entirely self-written -- with production help from hit-making A-listers including Sean Garrett (Fergie’s London Bridge; Beyonce’s Ring The Alarm Chris Brown’s Run It; and Ciara’s Goodies) and a list of hot up-and-comers from New York, Toronto, London and Australia. A satisfying combination of compulsive rhythmic music and soul-deep, intimate ballads, “Things Happen For A Reason”, served notice that a major new singer-songwriter is on the scene.

This year the talented singer, songwriter will bring us her sophomore album “Feel Good” and I am sure we will be in for a treat.