Chappell Roan facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Chappell Roan
Roan performing in 2022
Born	Kayleigh Rose Amstutz (1998-02-19) February 19, 1998 (age 26) Willard, Missouri, U.S.
Occupation	Singer songwriter
Years active	2014–present
Relatives	Darin Chappell (uncle)
Musical career
Genres	Pop
Labels	Atlantic Island Amusement

Kayleigh Rose Amstutz (born February 19, 1998), known professionally as Chappell Roan ( CHAP-əl-_-rohn), is an American singer and songwriter. She first signed to Atlantic Records and released her debut EP, School Nights (2017). After being dropped from the label, she released a series of independent singles including "Pink Pony Club" which facilitated Roan's rise to prominence. She opened for Olivia Rodrigo on the Sour Tour and Guts World Tour.

Roan released her debut album The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess (2023) through Island Records which received critical acclaim. The album garnered a cult following and was a "sleeper hit" later being nominated for Album of the Year at the 67th Grammy Awards, where she won the Grammy Award for Best New Artist. In 2024, she released a follow-up single, "Good Luck, Babe!" which found commercial success and reached number four on the Billboard Hot 100. Several songs from her debut album subsequently entered various charts including "Hot to Go!" which peaked at number 15 on the Hot 100.

Early life

Kayleigh Rose Amstutz was born in Willard, Missouri, on February 19, 1998, the oldest of four children. Her mother, Kara (née Chappell), is a veterinarian, and her father, Dwight Amstutz, manages a family practice in Springfield, Missouri, and is a registered nurse in neurological and burn intensive care units. Her uncle is Missouri State Representative Darin Chappell. She has described her hometown and her upbringing as conservative and Christian. During her childhood, she attended church three times a week and spent some summers at Christian camps. In a 2023 Variety interview, she said that she struggled with her upbringing and snuck out often: "I just wanted to feel like a good person, but I had this part of me that wanted to escape so bad."

Roan began playing the piano when she was 10 or 11 years old and began taking lessons at the age of 12. She performed publicly for the first time at age 13, singing "The Christmas Song" at her school's talent show, which she won. When she was about 14 years old, she auditioned for America's Got Talent without success. At 14 or 15 years old, she began uploading covers to YouTube, drawing attention from various record labels. She began songwriting as she entered her teen years. She graduated a year early from Willard High School. Roan described missing many childhood experiences in the "messy" beginning of her music career, including her prom and high school graduation.

Career

2015–2021: Career beginnings with Atlantic

Roan began uploading on her YouTube channel in 2013, only posting covers and occasional original pieces. Along with her online presence, she also performed around her hometown, as well as Springfield, Missouri, from 2012 to 2015. In November 2014, Roan uploaded her original song "Die Young" to YouTube under the name Kayleigh Rose. She wrote the song while attending summer camp at Interlochen Center for the Arts, which she said "changed my trajectory forever". She subsequently traveled to New York for several musical showcases, leading to her signing with music label Atlantic Records in May 2015. In 2016, she adopted the stage name Chappell Roan in honor of her grandfather Dennis K. Chappell, who died of brain cancer that same year. The name is a combination of her grandfather's last name and a word taken from his favorite song, "The Strawberry Roan" by Curley Fletcher. She has also expressed dislike for her birth name.

On August 3, 2017, Roan released her first single, "Good Hurt". The song was reviewed favorably in Interview, which praised her "striking maturity and surprisingly deep vocals". On September 22, 2017, she released an extended play (EP) titled School Nights through Atlantic Records. Also in 2017, she supported Vance Joy on his Lay It On Me Tour. During this time, Roan lived with her parents in Springfield, Missouri, flying with them to Los Angeles or New York City when necessary. In 2018, Roan moved to Los Angeles. She has since stated this was the first time she felt able to live openly as a queer woman, as well as feeling "overwhelmed with complete love and acceptance", allowing her to begin "writing songs as the real [her]". From January to March 2018, she toured the United States with Declan McKenna.

Roan began working with songwriter and producer Dan Nigro in late 2018. In April 2020, Roan released "Pink Pony Club", which she has described as a "hard left turn" from School Nights. The single was produced by Nigro, and its music video was directed by Griffin Stoddard.

Roan released two more singles, "Love Me Anyway" and "California", in May 2020. However, her releases were not profitable enough for Atlantic, who dropped Roan from the label in August 2020. Her boyfriend of four years broke up with her the same week, and she spent the next two years working as a production assistant as well as a barista and nanny to support herself. That December, USA Today ranked "Pink Pony Club" third on a list of the "10 best songs of 2020"; an accompanying description characterized it as dance-pop that "earnestly [celebrates] queer culture, acceptance and chasing your dreams". A year after its release, Vulture described "Pink Pony Club" as "the Song of Summer 2021", calling it a "synthy infectious bangarang". By As of August 2022^[update], the song had been streamed more than 10 million times on Spotify.

In early 2021, the success of Olivia Rodrigo's "Drivers License" shifted Nigro's focus from Roan as he worked on Sour with Rodrigo. Roan was unable to find a collaborator whom she liked as much. She briefly moved back to Missouri to work on her music independently while working in a drive-through.

2022–present: Breakthrough with The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess

Roan moved back to Los Angeles in October 2020 to continue working on her music independently while working a series of odd jobs, including as a production assistant and in a donut shop. She then earned a publishing deal with Sony.

Roan performing at the Vogue Theatre in 2022

In August 2022, she released a third independent single, "Femininomenon". Earmilk described the song as "so fun and loud but so intricate" and noted it was different from Roan's past releases. Roan stated that the song, which was produced by Nigro, was an attempt to "get away with being as ridiculous as I possibly can". An accompanying self-directed music video featured Roan riding a dirt bike. Roan released another single, "Casual", which she had begun working on with Nigro in 2020. The song, produced by Nigro, criticizes a romantic partner who refuses to commit and was inspired by Roan's brief relationship during the COVID-19 pandemic that ended with her partner saying they had met someone else.

In February 2023, Roan embarked on the Naked in North America Tour, her debut headlining tour. Each stop on the tour had a theme, with Roan suggesting outfits for fans while making her own camp costumes herself. Inspired by Orville Peck, Roan chose to book drag queens as openers for the tour. Concerts from the tour received positive reviews in The Harvard Crimson and Variety, with Jem Aswad describing it as a concert where "you recognize when a new-ish artist's career is about to blast off" similar to Lorde in 2013 and Billie Eilish in 2019. In March 2023, Roan released "Casual", followed later that year by the release of subsequent singles "Kaleidoscope", "Red Wine Supernova" and "Hot to Go!".

On September 22, 2023, Roan released her debut full-length album, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess, and began her second headlining tour, the Midwest Princess Tour. The tour, ending in the spring of 2024, traveled across North America and had shows in London, Paris, Berlin, Melbourne, Brisbane, Sydney, and Amsterdam. Roan donated $1 per ticket sold to the nonprofit For the Gworls and opened each show with drag performers. The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess was included in various best-albums-of-2023 year-end lists, such as those by The A.V. Club, Time, Nylon, Dork, Rolling Stone, Billboard, and Vogue. It was also listed as one of Pitchfork's 22 Best Pop Albums of 2023 and was named Pop Buzz's Number One Album of 2023.

Roan opened for Olivia Rodrigo's Guts World Tour in the United States and Canada from February to April 2024. In Roan's first week of the tour, her streams rose by 32 percent. Also in February, Roan was a musical guest on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. In March, NPR Music released Roan's Tiny Desk Concert performance.

In April 2024, Roan released the single "Good Luck, Babe!", describing it as "the first song of the next chapter". The song speaks about compulsory heterosexuality, describing a woman trying to deny her romantic feelings for Roan and women in general. Praised by Billboard as a "well-deserved breakthrough", the song received 7 million streams in its first week, was listed in the Spotify top ten, and debuted at number 77 on the Billboard Hot 100. The song was Roan's fastest to hit 100 million streams on the platform. By June, the song became her first top 20 hit on the Billboard Hot 100, and by August, it reached a peak of number six, becoming her first top ten song on the chart. Although not included on her debut album, the single's success was a catalyst for propelling it to worldwide recognition. In June 2024, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess entered the top ten on the Billboard 200 for the first time, with over 40,000 equivalent album units sold. By August, the album had reached number two.

In April, Roan performed at Coachella. At this time, Roan saw growing success on Spotify, with her monthly listeners increasing more than 500% from February to April. As reported by Billboard, by June 2024, Roan's weekly streams had grown by more than twenty-fold from the start of the year. That same month, Roan revealed she had declined an invitation from the White House to perform for that year's Pride celebration. During the Governors Ball Music Festival, Roan stated, "we want liberty, justice and freedom for all. When you do that, that's when I'll come", mentioning the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and transgender rights. Later in 2024, she revealed that she considered attending, but instead of performing music, she would recite poetry by Palestinian women. She discussed the idea with her publicist. Roan said that her publicist was supportive, but warned her that doing so at the White House would likely compromise her and her family's safety, which is why she decided to decline the invitation instead. Responding to Roan's support for Palestine, Bill Maher claimed that, paradoxically, she would be "thrown off the roof" by locals in Gaza for her camp style.

Roan debuted an unreleased song titled "Subway" as part of her performance at the Governors Ball Music Festival, continuing to work towards a new album. At a concert in June, Roan spoke to the crowd about dealing with her rapid increase in popularity, stating "I think my career is just kind of going really fast and it's really hard to keep up. I'm just being honest, I'm having a hard time today. [...] This is all I've ever wanted—it's just heavy sometimes." Following her performance at Lollapalooza in August, she drew the biggest daytime set and largest crowds ever seen at the festival.

In September, Roan performed at the 2024 MTV Video Music Awards and won Best New Artist. She dedicated the trophy to queer and trans people. In October 2024, she reached number 1 for the first time on the Billboard Artist 100, coinciding with the biggest sales week ever of her debut album. Roan appeared as the musical guest on Saturday Night Live on November 2, 2024, along with host John Mulaney, where she performed and teased a new country-tinged song titled "The Giver". Roan appeared in the Netflix special A Nonsense Christmas with Sabrina Carpenter on December 6, 2024. In January 2025, Roan was named the winner of the Sound of 2025 poll of musicians and music experts, organized annually by the BBC.

In February 2025 at the 67th Grammy Awards, Roan won her first Grammy Award for Best New Artist. In her acceptance speech, she called for record labels to provide artists with a livable wage and healthcare, saying "Labels, we got you, but do you got us?" Roan's work was also nominated for other awards, with The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess being nominated for Album of the Year and Best Pop Vocal Album and "Good Luck, Babe!" being nominated for Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best Pop Solo Performance.

Artistry

Roan writes most of her songs with co-writers, most prominently her producer, Nigro, with her song "Kaleidoscope" being the only song from her debut album written solely by Roan herself. After the release of her debut single, "Good Hurt", her style was described in Interview as "pop sound [...] infused with a dark and unsettling tone that underscores her intense, somber lyrics." In 2018, she described her musical style as a mix of organic and electronic sounds, with a pop tone, and as "dark pop with ballad undertones". In her songs written while she was a teenager, according to Atwood Magazine, she "brought the hardship and turbulence of our teenaged years to life with a candidness and vividness seldom seen from her peers." Roan describes her music as "kind of the fairytale version of what happened in real life" as her persona is a larger-than-life version of her real self. In 2024, Billboard described her as an "innovative art-pop auteur."

Voice

Even in her early days, Roan received praise for her vocal abilities. In 2014, Troye Sivan and Connor Franta commended the then-16-year-old Roan's singing. Sivan said that he had not heard a voice like Roan's since Adele, and Franta called her a "vocally gifted goddess." Despite this, Roan has criticized her past singing, saying that she never had a "proper" vocal lesson until December 2022 and that she'd been "singing wrong" for 10 years. In a Vox feature, Constance Grady described Roan's vocal style in her early music as the "indie girl slur that was so popular at the time" and likened it to singing in cursive. She named "Pink Pony Club" as the song that marked the beginning of Roan's vocal evolution.

Roan has been described as having a soprano vocal range. Writing for the official Grammy Awards site, Kelly Nguyen lauded Roan's "near-perfect vocal stability." In a review of Roan's live show at Heaven, a gay club in London, Poppie Platt of The Daily Telegraph praised Roan's "soaring, pitch-perfect high notes," writing that each note "shudder[ed] with feeling."

Inspiration

Roan has cited Kate Bush as a prominent influence. She has also cited inspirations including the artist Abbey Watkins, the film The Beguiled, and musical artists alt-J, Stevie Nicks, Ellie Goulding, Lorde, and Lana Del Rey. In 2023, on an exclusive interview for Pop Crave, Roan stated that she listened to Lorde, Del Rey and Goulding throughout her entire high school years. She has stated that the song "Stay" by Rihanna inspired her to begin writing music. In 2023, a Variety article described Roan as "glammy and pop and embracing her femininity and shared Gen-Z generational experiences, and also very queer-positive." Roan has also cited Lady Gaga and Nicki Minaj as inspiration for her attitude towards making people feel confident with her music. Roan spoke in admiration of Ariana Grande, calling herself "an Arianator". Discovering artists like Katy Perry, Kesha, Britney Spears, and Pink during her adolescence also influenced her to start writing music and construct her onstage persona. Roan stated she was raised on Christian rock during her childhood but never identified with it, instead having a curiosity about pop music.

Roan's makeup and hair is primarily inspired by drag makeup, including queens like Violet Chachki. Roan's makeup also takes inspiration from Boy George, 1980s punk, and Vivienne Westwood. Roan described her makeup looks for the Coachella festival as "Paris Hilton and James St. James or Walt Cassidy became one and put on a drag show." Roan is also heavily inspired by the Club Kids scene. While on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, Roan stated her stage looks reference horror movies, burlesque, and theater. Roan also described her outlook for her on-stage costumes, "I love looking pretty and scary. Or, like, pretty and tacky. Or just not pretty. I love that too. I just think it's just not serious, I love that fans find such deep meanings to things and I'm just like, 'I don't know, I thought I looked hot.' Like, I don't know if it's anything more than that." Roan considers herself a drag queen with her own persona, stating, "I've never fully understood why women shouldn't be allowed to do drag because – yes, I do drag! [...] It feels like they don't like women doing certain things. Another man trying to tell a woman what to do. Just try telling me what to do! I'm a drag queen – whether you like it when women do it or not."

Personal life

Roan lives in Los Angeles. Following her rapid commercial breakthrough, Roan spoke frequently of the pressures of her newfound fame and condemned behavior from some fans that she considered "creepy" and "invasive".

Filmography

Film

Television

Discography

Studio albums

Extended plays

Singles

Other charted and certified songs

Music videos

Awards and nominations

Tours

Chappell Roan performing at First Avenue on The Midwest Princess Tour in 2023.

Headlining

• Naked in North America Tour (2023)
• The Midwest Princess Tour (2023–2024)

Supporting

• Vance Joy – Lay It On Me Tour (2017)
• Coast Modern - On Tour (2017)
• Declan McKenna – What Do You Think About The Car? Tour (2018)
• Olivia Rodrigo – Sour Tour (2022)
• Ben Platt – The Reverie Tour (2022)
• Fletcher – Girl of My Dreams Tour (2022)
• Olivia Rodrigo – Guts World Tour (2024)

See also

In Spanish: Chappell Roan para niños