Anna Calvi

Anna Margaret Michelle Calvi grew up near Putney, southwest London, with her older sister, now a writer. Both her English mother and Italian father are therapists practising hypnotherapy.

In her infancy Anna was forced to undergo two-and-a-half-years of treatments and operations to correct her dislocated hips - a condition she was born with.

Anna grew up being exposed to a multitude of genres of music by her father. She cites the classical composers Ravel and Debussy among her influences and aims to condense the grand ebb and flow of classical compositions into dark, romantic, atmospheric pop songs. "Musically, I love the sense of tension and release that you get a lot in orchestral music," she told The Guardian. "You get it in bite-sized form in pop music but I like to extend it and make the most of it, because I find it really exciting; the dynamics you get from really building something up until it's almost unbearable, then letting it go."