Maria Mena

Maria Mena
Maria Mena at stage during Stavernfestivalen in 2016
Background information
Birth name	Maria Viktoria Mena
Born	(1986-02-19) February 19, 1986 (age 31) Oslo, Norway
Genres	Pop, Folk, Rock
Occupation(s)	Singer-songwriter
Instruments	Voice
Years active	2002–present
Labels	Sony Music Norway, Columbia
Website	www.mariamena.no

Maria Viktoria Mena (born 19 February 1986) is a Norwegian pop artist, best known for her single "You're the Only One" which charted in multiple countries.

Maria Mena was born into an artistic family. Her mother is a playwright and her father is a drummer. Both Maria and her brother, Tony, are named after characters from Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story. Her mother is Norwegian and her father is American of Afro-Nicaraguan descent.

Her father played in several bands in Oslo, which influenced Mena to write and record her own music. When Mena was nine years old, her parents divorced. She suffered from depression and developed an eating disorder.

When Mena was 13 years old, she moved to live with her father. She sang and wrote lyrics as a form of self-soothing. "My Lullaby", a song from Mena's diary, expresses her pain from her parents' divorce. After pleading with her father to make a demo, he contacted some acquaintances in the music industry to record the demo. Presenting his daughter's demo to several record companies, Sony Music signed Mena to their label.

In 2002, she released her debut single "Fragile (Free)" in Norway; however, it did not chart there. "My Lullaby" was released as the second single and the song reached number 5 on the Norwegian Singles Chart. It received heavy rotation on NRK P1, P3, P4, Radio 1, and Radio Oslo. The young singer quickly gained fans and soon earned her first platinum record. After the success of "My Lullaby", she released her debut album Another Phase in Norway which reached number 6 on the Norwegian Albums Chart. Mena made an appearance on the Late Show with David Letterman to promote her first international album, White Turns Blue, which debuted at the top position on the Billboard Top Heatseekers chart a week later and at number 102 on the Billboard 200. She made a breakthrough into the worldwide singles charts that year with "You're the Only One", a single successful in multiple countries. The song was her only single to appear on a Billboard chart, making #25 on the U.S. Top 40 Mainstream. "You're the Only One" peaked at #30 on the Dutch Top 40 and #19 on the Dutch Mega Single Top 100. Two months earlier, in March 2004, Mena had released her second album in Norway. Mellow. Less successful than her 2002 debut, it still managed to peak at #7 in Norway. The second single from both albums was "Just a Little Bit", which did not chart anywhere.