August 17, 1980 was a very special day in the Pedersen household as Lene was born. Her parents gave her the name Lene Marlin Pedersen, today the world knows her better as Lene Marlin. Her parents must have sensed something special about Lene as she grew, in fact Lene tells the story of being two years old and crying because she had to leave a guitar behind at the music store. She attributes some of her love for music and playing the guitar to that day as she found a deep interest in music, both in writing songs and singing. When Lene was 15 years old her parents surprised her with a guitar for christmas, this one she kept close to her heart. It almost seemed as though the guitar belonged in her hands, she learned to play quickly and before long was performing for a small group of friends. Several of her first songs were recorded on her home cassette player which she would then playback and begin to refine her songs.
Sometime during the summer of 1997, NRK (the main norwegian TV/Radio station) in Lene's hometown, Tromsø, received a tip about this talented young girl who wrote and played her own songs, writing them from her room at home. The TV station invited her in to record a song. Someone who worked for NRK heard her music and told Per-Erik Johansen at Virgin Records about Lene. Three weeks later a contract had been signed and Lene's life took an interesting turn.
In 1998 came the release in Norway of her first single "Unforgivable Sinner". It proved to be a huge hit as it reached number one and kept that position for 8 weeks. It was also the fastest selling single in Norwegian music history. Her second single "Sitting Down Here" also did very well in Norway and led into the release of her album "Playing My Game" on March 22 in Norway. In only 3 days the album sold 50,000 copies, quite the accomplishment in a country with a population of 4.4 million. (To put that in perspective for those in the US, that would mean that an artist would need to sell 3.4 million in the US in 3 days to match her numbers.)
During 1999 her album sales have soared. Her album continues to sell well in Europe, today album sales total around 1,500,000. This is a very promising sign for Lene Marlin, her management, and Virgin Records.
Lene won four awards at the norwegian grammy awards in 1999, as well as the MTV-Europe award for Best Nordic Act in Dublin on November 11, 1999, being yet another sign that this young lady is reaching heights that few have ever seen.
Virgin has decided not to release her current album in the US. This due to a number of factors, one of which involves the amount of time she would need to spend in the US for the album to succeed. We are hopeful that in the near future, maybe with the release of her next album, Virgin will give some serious consideration and focus on the US market as well.
