Justin Bieber is a highly celebrated singer and songwriter, as well as a chart-topping pop and R&B artist. Where is this star originally from?
Justin Bieber is Canadian. He is originally from London, Ontario in Canada, and was raised in Stratford, Ontario. Bieber is of French-Canadian, Irish, English, Scottish, and German descent, and has also claimed that he has Aboriginal Canadian ancestry.
Read more below to find out about Bieber’s attachment to his Canadian citizenship, his life in Canada, and how he got into the music industry.
Canadian Citizenship
Even though Bieber has lived in the United States for a long time, he said he had no interest in becoming an American citizen. “You guys are evil,” he joked in an interview with Rolling Stone back in 2011. “Canada’s the best country in the world.”
“We go to the doctor and we don’t need to worry about paying him, but here, your whole life, you’re broke because of medical bills. My bodyguard’s baby was premature, and now he has to pay for it. In Canada, if your baby’s premature, he stays in the hospital as long as he needs to, and then you go home,” he explained of his preference for Canada.
Biber has been outspoken about his love for Canada throughout his career in interviews as well as on social media. In this Twitter post, for example, which he sent out in June of 2020, he writes, “I am a proud Canadian” in response to Justin Trudeau increasing the money Canada has allocated to provide resources for communities struggling with coronavirus worldwide.
As one of his fans pointed out in this Twitter post, Bieber’s Canadian-ness is seen even through his music. “Is no one gonna talk ‘bout how Justin Bieber, who is a Canadian, has a song called ‘Sorry’?” the post reads, referring to the common polite personality of Canadians, and their propensity to apologize.
There’s no doubt that Bieber is proud of his Canadian roots, despite having lived in the United States for the second half of his life. His marriage to the American model and television personality, Hailey Baldwin, in 2018, may have changed his mind about becoming an American citizen.
Biber was living in the United States with an O-1 visa, making him a temporary resident based on his “extraordinary ability or achievement” in a field, Bieber’s field being the music industry. As TMZ reported, Bieber applied for American citizenship in 2018 while planning to keep his Canadian citizenship.
Though he is getting American citizenship, there’s no way that Bieber will renounce his Canadian citizenship, especially after buying a five million dollar estate in Ontario. Bieber and Baldwin were married in 2018 in a New York courthouse, with their official ceremony taking place in Bluffton, South Carolina, in late 2019.
From Ontario to California
Bieber was born on March 1st in London, Ontario, in 1994, and spent his childhood in Stratford, Ontario. From an early age, Bieber was interested in music, learning to play the piano, guitar, drums, and trumpet, as well as developing his singing voice.
In 2007, Bieber entered a local singing competition in Stratford, and earned second place with his performance of Ne-Yo’s “So Sick.” Bieber’s mother recorded many of his performances and covers of R&B songs, placing them on YouTube, where he quickly gained fans.
Scooter Braun, an American talent manager, saw some of Bieber’s videos online and reached out to him, eventually flying him to Atlanta to meet Usher. Biber then signed with Island Records and RBMG, of which Usher and Braun are partners.
Bieber quickly reached stardom as a fan-favorite teen pop star, before becoming more of an R&B artist later in his career.
Check out the YouTube video below to see Justin Bieber singing Ne-Yo’s “So Sick” in the Stratford singing competition when he was 12 years old.