Lena Zavaroni

Lena Zavaroni
Lena Zavaroni at age 10 in front of a miniature of the Peace Palace in Madurodam (1974).
Background information
Birth name	Lena Hilda Zavaroni
Born	(1963-11-04)4 November 1963 Greenock, Renfrewshire, Scotland, UK
Origin	Rothesay, Isle of Bute, Scotland, UK
Died	1 October 1999(1999-10-01) (aged 35)
Occupation(s)	Singer
Years active	1974–1986

Lena Hilda Zavaroni (4 November 1963 – 1 October 1999) was a Scottish child singer and a television show host. With her album Ma! (He's Making Eyes At Me) at ten years of age, she is the youngest person in history to have an album in the top ten of the UK Albums Chart. Later in life she hosted TV shows and appeared on stage. From the age of 13 Zavaroni suffered from anorexia nervosa which became clinical depression two years later at the age of 15. Lena died at the age of 35 from pneumonia.

Zavaroni was born in Greenock, Renfrewshire, and grew up in the small town of Rothesay on the Isle of Bute with musical parents, who owned a fish and chip shop. Zavaroni's father, Victor, played the guitar, and her mother, Hilda, sang, and Zavaroni herself sang from the age of two. Her grandfather had immigrated from Italy.

Zavaroni was discovered in the summer of 1973 by record producer Tommy Scott, who was on holiday in Rothesay and heard her singing with her father and uncle in a band. Scott contacted impresario Phil Solomon, which led to his partner Dorothy Solomon's becoming Zavaroni's manager.

In 1974 Zavaroni appeared on Opportunity Knocks hosted by Hughie Green and won the show for a record-breaking five weeks running. She followed this with the album Ma! (He's Making Eyes At Me), a collection of classic and then-recent pop standards which reached number eight in the UK album chart. At 10 years, 146 days old, Zavaroni remains the youngest person to have an album in the Top 10.