Olivia Newton-John A Biography

Dame Olivia Newton-John AC DBE was a British-Australian singer, songwriter, actress, entrepreneur, and activist.

She was born on 26 September 1948 in Cambridge, United Kingdom, to Welshman Brinley "Bryn" Newton-John and Irene Helene . Her Jewish maternal grandfather, the Nobel Prize–winning physicist Max Born, fled with his wife and children to Britain from Germany before World War II to escape the Nazi regime. Newton-John's maternal grandmother was of paternal Jewish ancestry as well; through her, she was a third cousin of comedian Ben Elton. Her maternal great-grandfather was the jurist Victor Ehrenberg and her matrilineal great-grandmother's father was the jurist Rudolf von Jhering.

Newton-John's father was an MI5 officer on the Enigma project at Bletchley Park who took Rudolf Hess into custody during World War II. After the war, he became the headmaster of the Cambridgeshire High School for Boys and was in this position when Olivia was born.

She attended Christ Church Grammar School in the Melbourne suburb of South Yarra and then the University High School near Ormond College.

At age 14, Newton-John formed Sol Four, a short-lived all-girl group, with three classmates, often performing in a coffee shop owned by her brother-in-law. She became a regular on local Australian television shows including Time for Terry and The Happy Show where she performed as "Lovely Livvy".

Newton-John recorded her first single, "Till You Say You'll Be Mine", in Britain for Decca Records in 1966.

Newton-John released her first solo album, If Not for You , in 1971. The title track, written by Bob Dylan and previously recorded by former Beatle George Harrison for his 1970 album All Things Must Pass, was her first international hit . Her follow-up single, "Banks of the Ohio", was a top 10 hit in the UK and Australia. She was voted Best British Female Vocalist two years in a row by the magazine Record Mirror. She made frequent appearances on Cliff Richard's weekly show It's Cliff Richard and starred with him in the telefilm The Case.

Newton-John finished fourth at the contest held in Brighton behind ABBA's winning Swedish entry, "Waterloo". All six Eurovision contest song candidates—"Have Love, Will Travel", "Lovin' You Ain't Easy", "Long Live Love", "Someday", "Angel Eyes" and "Hands Across the Sea"—were recorded by Newton-John and included on her Long Live Love album, her first for the EMI Records label.

Newton-John left the UK and moved to the US. She topped the Pop and Country albums charts with her next album, Have You Never Been Mellow. For 45 years, Olivia held the Guinness World Record for the shortest gap by a female between new Number 1 albums on the US Billboard 200 album charts until Taylor Swift in 2020 . The album generated two singles – the John Farrar-penned title track and "Please Mr. Please" . However, her pop career cooled with the release of her next album, Clearly Love. Her streak of five consecutive gold top 10 singles on the Billboard Hot 100 ended when the album's first single, "Something Better to Do", stopped at No. 13 .

Newton-John's singles continued to easily top the AC chart, where she ultimately amassed ten No. 1 singles.


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