Amy Winehouse has died aged 27, police have confirmed.
The singer was found by paramedics at her home in Camden, north London. The cause of death is as yet unexplained.
Winehouse had a short but acclaimed musical career. She dropped out of school aged 16 and signed with Island Records within two years. Her first album, 2003’s Frank, was nominated for the Mercury Music prize, and her second, Back to Black, won it.
In 2007, she married Blake Fielder-Civil – their earlier break-up had inspired Back to Black – but the marriage collapsed, its end attributed to their drug-taking. A series of arrests followed, and in 2008 she was filmed taking crack cocaine and ecstasy. The story soon appeared in The Sun newspaper.
Of her musical talent, Clive James once said: “A gift on that scale is not possessed by its owner, but does all the possessing.” He wrote in 2008:
Then there’s Amy Winehouse, whose best songs really are works of art, no question. And she can actually sing them to you, in a way you would rather remember than forget. And yet she looks as if she can’t wait until it’s all over.
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