Bryan Adams's Real Name: Bryan Guy Adams

Quick answer: The singer is known professionally as Bryan Adams. Britannica and Encyclopedia.com independently give the fuller form Bryan Guy Adams and date his birth to November 5, 1959, in Kingston, Ontario, Canada (Britannica; Encyclopedia.com).

Real name and early life

Independent publishers support the documented full name Bryan Guy Adams. Encyclopedia.com names his parents as Conrad, a diplomat, and Jane Adams, former British citizens, and says a childhood of moves followed his father's work, including schools in England, Austria, Portugal, and Israel, before he lived with his mother in Vancouver, British Columbia, when he was 16. Britannica independently says his father served in the Canadian army, as a United Nations peacekeeping observer, and as a diplomat, necessitating many relocations, and that after his parents divorced he lived with his mother just north of Vancouver. Britannica says he taught himself guitar and, at 16, left high school, having already been lead vocalist for the Canadian band Sweeney Todd.

Career highlights

Britannica says the albums Cuts Like a Knife (1983) and Reckless (1984) made him one of the most popular recording artists of the 1980s, and that Reckless reached the top of the charts and spawned his first number-one single, "Heaven." Encyclopedia.com independently names Cuts Like a Knife as the album that pushed him to stardom and describes Reckless as still more popular, including "Heaven" and "The Summer of '69," but in some passages dates Reckless to 1985. This page records Britannica's 1984 date and Encyclopedia.com's 1985 wording rather than treating them as the same year.

Britannica says he won a Grammy Award, an MTV Video Music Award, and an American Music Award for the 1991 hit "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You," from the film Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, and lists a Grammy in 1992. Encyclopedia.com independently says that song reached number one in 19 countries and records a Grammy for best song written specifically for a motion picture or television, dated 1991. Both name the album Waking Up the Neighbours / Waking up the Neighbours around 1991. Britannica lists him as an Officer of the Order of Canada in 1998; Encyclopedia.com says he received the Order of Canada and the Order of British Columbia in 1990. This page records both year wordings.

Name notes for searchers

People looking up Bryan Adams or Bryan Guy Adams are looking for the same Canadian singer-songwriter. Independent sources support the fuller form used in the title.