Michael Holbrook Penniman Jr., who performs as MIKA, was born in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1983 to an American-born Lebanese mother and an Israeli-born American father. The family left for Paris when he was a year old because of the Lebanese civil war, and he grew up mostly in London, where music became the place he felt most at home after a difficult, bullied childhood.
He broke through in 2007 with "Grace Kelly" and the album Life in Cartoon Motion, an operatic, technicolor kind of pop that sold more than five million copies and won him a BRIT Award. Hits like "Love Today," "Big Girl (You Are Beautiful)," and "Relax, Take It Easy" followed, along with a run of albums through the 2010s and a French-language record. He has also sat as a coach and judge on The Voice and X Factor in several European countries, and designs sunglasses, clothing, and watches on the side, treating pop stardom as one of several outlets for the same restless creativity.