Ruth B.

Ruth Berhe (born July 2, 1995), better known by her stage name Ruth B., is a Canadian singer and songwriter from Edmonton, Alberta. She started by singing songs on Vine in early 2013. In November 2015, she released her debut extended play, The Intro. On May 5, 2017, she released her debut album, Safe Haven. It has gathered over 645 million overall streams on Spotify, and her hit single "Lost Boy" has accumulated over 495 million streams on Spotify alone as of May 2020. Her YouTube channel has received a total of 255 million views.

Early life and education

Berhe was born and raised in Edmonton, Alberta. Her parents emigrated from Ethiopia in the 1980s. Berhe speaks Amharic fluently. She spent some of her teenage years working at a local Reitmans clothing store and described herself in an interview with The Canadian Press as an "introvert". She said she was "never the big party chick." While working part-time she started to dabble in posting videos on Vine. She says she chose the six-second video service because it took less effort to upload short clips, compared to other popular services like YouTube.

Berhe graduated from Ross Sheppard High School in 2013. She attended MacEwan University, but took time off her studies to focus on music.

Career

Berhe posted her first Vine video on May 9, 2013, and started making singing Vines about a year later. Her singing Vines, typically six second covers of popular songs, helped grow her a following. In November 2014, she posted a Vine of her singing a line that she had made up, which was inspired by the television series Once Upon a Time. It garnered around 84,000 likes within a week, which was unusual for her at the time. She took note of its popularity, with some of her followers commenting that she should make it into a full song. It became "Lost Boy", which she posted on YouTube on January 18, 2015 and was released on iTunes on February 12, 2015.

Berhe entered the studio in early 2016 to begin recording her debut full-length album with Joel Little, a New Zealand producer who helped Lorde create her first album. She says she was writing songs long before the album went into production, so she had many songs to pick from when her label told her it was time to start putting something together.

She honored National Arts Centre Award winner Michael Buble at the Governor General's Performing Arts Awards gala by performing his song "Home". Later at the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony she performed Neil Young's song "Heart of Gold" to honor his induction into the Canadian Songwriters Hall Of Fame.

At the 2017 Juno Awards Berhe was nominated for the Juno Fan Choice Award, Songwriter of the Year and won Breakthrough Artist of the Year. She later performed her single "Lost Boy."

The following year at the 2018 Juno Awards she was nominated for three awards including Artist of the Year, Album of the Year, and Pop Album of the Year.

In 2018, the CBC Kids television series Addison debuted, with a theme song performed by Berhe. In May 2018, her song "Shadows" appeared in the second season of the Netflix series Dear White People.

Discography

Studio albums

EPs

Singles

As lead artist

Promotional singles

Awards and nominations

Artistry

Berhe has listed Lauryn Hill, The Beatles, Carole King, Grouplove, Adele, Taylor Swift and Ed Sheeran as some of her musical influences. She said that "the one thing all my favourite artists have in common is they are all storytellers. Something that I try to incorporate in my music", in an interview with Idolator.