Biography
Her Story
The Beginning…
Just like every other people, Kelly went through the same route that everyone else took. She didn’t think that she would be a singer one day. In an interesting twist of fate, her friend brought her to a singing competition where she was impressed with what she saw. Kelly was 19 then. It marked the start of her journey of music as she decided that she wants to perform and sing on the stage one day.
Strong-willed and determined, Kelly made gradual steps towards fulfilling her dreams. Driven by her passion to sing and her love for music, Kelly started writing lyrics and composing songs. As she didn’t go through any formal training in music, she would hum the melody and record it down using her handphone. Her first self-composed song is “December下雪的冬天“. It’s a soothing and melancholic love song where Kelly personified a snowy December. Kelly submitted the song for the tertiary songwriting competition, “NUS心情溶剂“, where she won the 3rd place. In her second attempt at songwriting, she wrote “Crazy” which is a soft-rock number. With this song, she won the 3rd at another tertiary songwriting competition, “NTU音乐时空“. It’s evident that Kelly is musically-talented. She enrolled herself into Lee Wei Song School of Music where she took up music lessons.
After graduating from Singapore Polytechnic with a diploma in Maritime Management, Kelly found a job as an air stewardess with the Singapore Airlines. Despite her hectic schedule as an air stewardess, her passion for singing and music never dwindled. She enrolled herself into Tiny Box Music where she went under the tutelage of renowned musician, Roy 黎沸挥. Seeing the potential in Kelly, Roy handpicked Kelly and two other people for individual music lessons. Roy is a stern, no-nonsense teacher who made his students undergo rigorous music training. Due to the immense pressure, the two other people dropped out of the class while Kelly persevered on. However, it was not a smooth-flowing journey for Kelly either. Under the teachings of stern Roy, Kelly often broke down in tears and was thrown out of class quite a number of times. Despite these, Kelly never gave up and would always make her way back to the music school.
The Start of Her Journey…
Project Superstar, a nationwide talent-search competition by Channel U, marked a significant milestone in Kelly’s music career. Egged on by her friends, Kelly joined the competition only in the final round of audition. During the first round of quarter final, Kelly sang Coco Lee’s 美丽笨女人 (Mei Li Ben Nü Ren). Her rendition of the song was so mesmerizing and smooth, it left an immediate impression with the judges and the audience. Soon, Kelly was touted as the Project Superstar contestant with the most potential by various media. However, to the shock of everyone, Kelly was booted out of the competition despite scoring the highest with the judges. Perhaps the fans were complacent and didn’t cast enough votes for her. In the revival round, she sang A*Mei’s Open Your Eyes. Her delivery of the song won her many new fans as well as the judges’ compliments. With the highest points for the round as well as the support of many fans, Kelly successfully “revived” back into the competition.
Throughout the entire competition, Kelly exhibited her versatility, ability to improvise songs, as well as her dancing talent. Her performance were consistent and won much compliments from the critics. In the female’s Finals of Project Superstar, Kelly won almost two-third of the number of votes casted and was crowned the female champion of Project Superstar. With that victory, Kelly’s first single was launched on 21st August 2005. In the space of two weeks, it sold more than 11,500 copies in Singapore.
The stage was set, as she made her way to Singapore Indoor Stadium for the Grand Finals of Project Superstar. Her performances that night impressed many people including the judges who felt that she gave a better performances in four of the five rounds. However, she lost out in the number of votes and didn’t manage to win the overall competition. Despite losing in the Grand Finals, Universal Music saw the huge potential in Kelly and signed her up.
This marked the birth of a superstar - Kelly 潘嘉丽.
Next…
Kelly’s versatility and youthful image has attracted many endorsement offers from various companies and products, surpassing other newcomers. Right after the Project Superstars competition, Kelly clinched a number of product endorsement deals including being Maybelline New York’s first ever local spokesperson, the only ambassador for My© NETS CashCard and not forgetting the endorsement for Zenique Skin & Body care etc.
Juggling between the filming of a Project Superstar idol drama, TV appearances, events and song recordings, Kelly’s debut solo album - “Love Me, Kelly” is finally launched on 14 February 2006! Backed by a number of famous Taiwanese and local songwriters as well as her mentor, Roy Li, the long awaited album consist of 8 original compositions, including one of Kelly’s original composition - 计时炸弹. In celebration of “Love Me, Kelly” achieving the Platinum Award, a new edition of the album is released on 24 April 2006. The new edition added on 2 new bonus tracks which was not released previously – On My Way, specially written for Kelly by Lee Wei Song and December, the very first song that Kelly has composed. Other bonuses of the album include ‘Kelly’s World’ Pictorial Booklet, MVs and a hidden track of a tune Kelly composed. This album marked another significant milestone in Kelly’s music career.
Kelly’s popularity is also evident in her song’s performance on 醉心龙虎榜, a music chart of YES 93.3 FM, Singapore’s most popular radio station. Tabulation on the 2006 chart results shows that Kelly is the Best Newcomer and is ranked fourth in the top 10 female artistes. A total of 3 songs went up the chart, namely 爱.无力, 计时炸弹 and On My Way and all 3 the songs entered the top 100 hit songs. In the 6th Global Chinese Music Award, Kelly was nominated for the Best Newcomer Award and Best Singapore Artiste Award.
Kelly is now based in Taiwan and her second album - 在世界中心 is slated to be out on 28 September 2007. Her main hit songs are Shakalaka Baby and 溺爱. This album uses promotional costumes from Hong Kong. Furthermore, works from Yao Chien, Lee Wei Song and even Kelly’s friends were employed. Kelly setted up a blog to keep her fans updated about her in Taiwan.