Ed Sheeran

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Ed Sheeran is an English singer-songwriter, born in 1991 in Halifax, West Yorkshire, and raised in Framlingham in Suffolk. His parents worked in the art world. As a child he sang in a church choir, learned to play the guitar at eleven and was already writing songs. At thirteen he released a first collection himself, Spinning Man. In 2008 he moved to London, where he played in small venues. Through YouTube and the video channel SB.TV his audience grew, and the rapper Example took him on tour.

Music and breakthrough

In 2011 he released the EP No.5 Collaborations Project himself, with grime artists such as Wiley and Ghetts, which climbed high in the iTunes chart without a label or promotion. He then signed to Asylum Records. His debut album + from 2011 topped the British album chart, with The A Team as the breakthrough. × from 2014 included Thinking Out Loud. The album ÷ from 2017 became the best-selling album of that year, with Shape of You and Castle on the Hill. After that came, among others, No.6 Collaborations Project, = in 2021 and − in 2023. By his own account, as reported in the source, he has sold 200 million records.

Influence

Sheeran often plays alone on acoustic guitar and uses a loop station to build up layers himself. He combines folk, pop and hip hop, and sings and raps fluidly in and out of each other. He is an example of an artist who became an enormous global star through the internet and small gigs, with songs that stand on their own.

Listening

Discography

Studio albums

• 2011+
• 2014+
• 2017+
• 2019No.6 Collaborations Project
• 2021+
• 2023+
• 2023Autumn Variations
• 2025Play