Billie Eilish has a catalog full of hits, but in the early days of her career, she felt very insecure about her vocals that she questioned whether she deserved to call herself a singer.
On the Sunday, December 8 episode of CBS Sunday Mornings, the “Bad Guy” hitmaker, 22, said she was convinced she wasn’t a “real singer” because of her soft singing voice.
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“I was told for so many years that I wasn’t a singer because a singer has a big powerhouse voice,” Eilish said. “Every judge on the talent show that I love would just be like, ‘If you’re a soft singer then that’s not enough.’”
Though Eilish didn’t compete on televised talent competitions, she said that watching people get rejected for vocal stylings similar to hers felt discouraging.
“I watched people on those shows, who have really beautiful soft voices, and they get rejected because of that,” Eilish said. “So I thought, ‘Okay, well then that means I’m not a real singer because I can’t do that.’ Because I also sang kind of quietly when I started out, and people always say that I whispered. That was the whole thing.”
To date, Eilish has two Billboard 200 No. 1 albums and nine Grammy awards. She is currently nominated for seven Grammy awards ahead of the 2025 ceremony, including Song of the Year for her hit single, “Birds of a Feather.”
It seems she’s more motivated than ever to make music. She released her third studio album, Hit Me Hard and Soft, in May and is already hard at work on her next project. Elsewhere in her Sunday Mornings segment, Eilish played snippets of new music she’s been working on.
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