Ella Marija Lani Yelich-O’Connor (born 7 November 1996), known professionally as Lorde, is a New Zealand singer and songwriter. Taking inspiration from aristocracy for her stage name, she is known for her unconventional musical styles and introspective songwriting.

Lorde expressed interest in performing at local venues in her early teens. She signed with Universal Music Group (UMG) in 2009 and collaborated with producer Joel Little in 2011 to start recording music. Their first effort, an extended play (EP) titled The Love Club, was self-released in 2012 for free download on SoundCloud before UMG’s commercial release in 2013. The EP’s international chart-topping single “Royals” helped raise Lorde to prominence. Her debut studio album Pure Heroine was released that same year to critical and commercial success. The following year, Lorde curated the soundtrack for the 2014 film The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 and recorded several tracks, including the single “Yellow Flicker Beat”.

Lorde’s second studio album Melodrama (2017) received widespread critical acclaim and debuted atop the US Billboard 200. For her third studio album, Solar Power (2021), she ventured into indie folk and psychedelic styles. The album reached number one in Australia and New Zealand and charted inside the top-10 in numerous countries, although it polarised music critics and fans alike.

Lorde’s accolades include two Grammy Awards, two Brit Awards, and a Golden Globe nomination. She appeared in Time’s list of the most influential teenagers in 2013 and 2014, and the 2014 edition of Forbes 30 Under 30. In addition to her solo work, she has co-written songs for other artists, including Broods and Bleachers. As of June 2017, Lorde had sold over five million albums worldwide.

Ella Marija Lani Yelich-O’Connor was born on 7 November 1996 in Takapuna, New Zealand, a suburb of Auckland, to poet Sonja Yelich (Croatian: Jelić) and civil engineer Vic O’Connor. Her mother was born to Croatian immigrants from the region of Dalmatia, while her father is of Irish descent. They announced their engagement in 2014, after a 30-year relationship, and they married in a 2017 private ceremony in Cheltenham Beach. Lorde holds dual New Zealand and Croatian citizenship.

Lorde is the second of four children: she has an elder sister Jerry, a younger sister India, and a younger brother Angelo. They were raised in Auckland’s North Shore suburbs of Devonport and Bayswater. At age five, she joined a drama group and developed public speaking skills. Her mother encouraged her to read a range of genres, which Lorde cited as a lyrical influence. More specifically, she cites the young adult dystopian novel Feed (2002) by M. T. Anderson as well as authors J. D. Salinger, Raymond Carver and Janet Frame for influencing her songwriting.

After a suggestion from a school instructor, her mother had her take the Woodcock–Johnson Tests of Cognitive Abilities to determine her intelligence. The results concluded that Lorde, age six, was a gifted child. She was briefly enrolled at George Parkyn Centre, a gifted education organisation. Sonja unenrolled her, however, citing social development concerns. As a child, Lorde attended Vauxhall School and then Belmont Intermediate School in her early teens. While attending Vauxhall, she placed third and first respectively in the North Shore Primary Schools’ Speech competition, a national contest, in 2006 and 2007. Lorde and her Belmont team were named the runner-up in the 2009 Kids’ Lit Quiz World Finals, a global literature competition for students aged 10 to 14.

In May 2009, Lorde and her friend Louis McDonald won the Belmont Intermediate School annual talent show as a duo. In August that year, Lorde and McDonald made a guest appearance on Jim Mora’s Afternoons show on Radio New Zealand. There, they performed covers of Pixie Lott’s “Mama Do (Uh Oh, Uh Oh)” and Kings of Leon’s “Use Somebody”. McDonald’s father then sent his recordings of the duo covering “Mama Do” and Duffy’s “Warwick Avenue” to Universal Music Group (UMG)’s A&R executive Scott Maclachlan. Maclachlan subsequently signed her to UMG for development.

Lorde was also part of the Belmont Intermediate School band Extreme; the band placed third in the North Shore Battle of the Bands finals at the Bruce Mason Centre, Takapuna, Auckland on 18 November 2009. In 2010, Lorde and McDonald formed a duet called “Ella & Louis” and performed covers live on a regular basis at local venues, including cafés in Auckland and the Victoria Theatre in Devonport. In 2011, UMG hired vocal coach Frances Dickinson to give her singing lessons twice a week for a year. During this time, Maclachlan attempted to partner Lorde with several different producers and songwriters, but without success. As she began writing songs, she learned how to “put words together” by reading short fiction.

Lorde performed her original songs for the first time at the Victoria Theatre in November 2011. In December, Maclachlan paired Lorde with Joel Little, a songwriter, record producer, and former Goodnight Nurse lead singer. The pair recorded five songs for an extended play (EP) at Little’s Golden Age Studios in Morningside, Auckland, and finished within three weeks. While working on her music career, she attended Takapuna Grammar School from 2010 to 2013, completing Year 12. She later chose not to return in 2014 to attend Year 13.