Paul Potts

Paul Potts was a Liberal Democrat councillor on Bristol City Council who sang opera in amateur productions when he entered the Britain's Got Talent TV show in 2007. His performance of Nessun Dorma won over the judges and audience alike and he went on to receive over a million votes to defeat Connie Talbot in the final and win the £100,000 prize money. He appeared at the Royal Variety Show in front of The Queen the same year and his debut album One Chance went straight to Number 1 in the UK, where it remained for six weeks; going on to sell over two million copies. After Potts appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show it also broke into the US Top 30 albums, his populist approach being dubbed as "poppera". His second album Passione was released in 2009, including material as varied as Chopin, Puccini, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Ewan MacColl's First Time Ever I Saw Your Face and Procol Harum's Whiter Shade Of Pale. It reached Number 5 in the UK charts.