Faith restored

National treasure, Katherine Jenkins, has been on a rollercoaster of a ride finding fame and faith

Welsh superstar, Katherine Jenkins, has come a long way since singing in her local church choir as a child.

Growing up, Katherine never set her sights on fame, yet she is now one of the world’s most successful classical singers of all time. To date, the mezzo-soprano singer has had 14 number one albums, and shows no signs of slowing down as she continues to win the nation’s heart with her exceptional voice.

Born in South Wales, Katherine learned to sing as a chorister in St. David’s Church choir, Neath. Her love of music was well nurtured in the Welsh valleys, where she had the opportunity to join choral groups, perform with Welsh male voice choirs and participate in musical events.

She has always accredited her down to earth nature to her Welsh roots and her supportive family. Sadly, Katherine’s father Selwyn died of lung cancer when she was just 15, and since then his memory has been the driving force in her life. Every album, every award is dedicated to him.

Experiencing such loss had a huge impact on Katherine. While she never stopped singing in church, she did stop believing in the God she was singing about.

Speaking to Woman Alive magazine, Katherine revealed: ‘I was brought up in the Christian faith. When we were growing up, my mum was a Sunday school teacher, so we were taught about God and the bible. Back then, church was a huge focal point in our home life and the local community. After my dad died and I moved to London to study, I sort of lost my faith for a while. I think I was so hurt and angry that God had taken my dad away.’

A crossroads moment

Katherine describes the passing of her father as ‘the crossroads moment’ of her childhood.

He was an older father and a househusband who looked after Katherine and her sister while their mum went to work. He died very suddenly just two weeks before Katherine began her GCSEs.

She shared in an interview with The Times: ‘Focusing so hard at school meant that initially I didn’t deal with my grief. I needed help to cope with it and had some therapy, but it made me want to push forward in the things that I love and care about, which has always been singing.’

And push forward she did. After receiving stellar GCSE grades and passing four A-levels, Katherine won a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music. Her ambition was to get into an opera chorus and slowly work her way up.

‘When I left Neath to go and study at the Royal Academy of Music, up until that point all the singing I had done was church music,’ Katherine explained to Northern Ireland news outlet News Letter. Talking about her successful career, she added: ‘I’d like to tell you that I thought all this was going to happen to me but in truth my dreams weren’t all that big. I really didn’t think that this could ever happen.

‘When I signed my first record contract my mum and I didn’t tell anyone for six months. My mum kept saying, “things like this don’t happen to people from Neath”, and I know what she meant. We didn’t know anybody in the music business or in show-business. It was just something I was doing for the love of it.’

Towards the end of her course, a producer friend made a demo for her, which was passed to Universal, and they signed her up for six albums; something which has been dubbed the biggest recording deal in UK classical music history.

In 2004, at the age of 23, Katherine released her debut album, which became her first classical number one album. Six months later, her second album also reached number one and went on to earn the star her first Classic BRIT Award.

Sold-out tours followed, as did performances and recordings with high-profile figures. At one point in her career she was outselling both the Spice Girls and Girls Aloud.

Katherine had it all. She was turning the grief from her childhood into motivation to live life to the full. But this season of her life was filled with trials too.

In her autobiography, she writes about fighting off a would-be rapist in the street; and about an eating disorder that saw her weight drop to less than seven stone. The singer has admitted on multiple occasions that when she was younger she didn’t feel comfortable in her skin and let herself get ‘too thin’ more than once.

Katherine also took drugs while at the Royal Academy of Music and, after a friend approached the press with an incriminating video, she was forced to do a tell-all interview about this with Piers Morgan. According to Katherine, she wasn’t taking much more than the average student, but she says its ‘the biggest regret’ of her life.

Despite fearing this confession would end her career, it actually gained her more credibility as the public respected her honesty.

A call from home

While Katherine was on top of her game, deep down she was still grief-stricken and hurting. She was touring the world and doing what she loved for a living, but she was still angry at God. One day, an unexpected phone call from her mum helped Katherine take a step towards faith again.

‘I was in Australia and my mum rang to tell me of an unusual experience she’d had while at church,’ Katherine explained to Woman Alive. ‘She told me that she’d been feeling very low and upset when, suddenly, she felt a great sense of comfort enfold her.’ The story made Katherine realise that through all the grief, her mum had never lost faith.

‘That story stuck with me, and it prompted me to go into a church in Sydney where I prayed and asked God to help me. From that moment it brought me back.’ Since then, Katherine has been on a journey of reconnecting with God and restoring her faith.

In 2014, the star married American artist and film producer Andrew Levitas. Just over a year later, the couple welcomed their first child, a daughter, followed by a son in 2018. Katherine often says becoming a mother has helped strengthen her faith.

The singer shared on Songs of Praise: ‘Being a mum focuses you and grounds you more, and for me I don’t think I have ever prayed as much as since being a mum.’ When asked what she prays for, the singer responded: ‘Everything. I pray for their health and their happiness because you are so thankful and grateful.’

After being a regular guest singer for many years, Katherine is now on the presenting team of BBC’s Songs of Praise; something she also claims has inspired her faith. She told Premier Christian Radio: ‘What I’m loving is when I’m out and meeting different people who worship in different ways – I find it so inspiring. That’s been something that’s helped my own faith.’

Katherine is extremely hardworking and compassionate. In all that she does she works hard to connect with people and encourage them. Throughout the pandemic she hosted Facebook shows from her home for hundreds of thousands of fans around the world, and most recently she hosted a show called Anyone Can Sing, where she helped six people learn to sing and find the confidence got perform in public.

Through her songs and work with Songs of Praise, Katherine Jenkins encourages people to find faith for themselves and trust in God, no matter what season of life they are in.