Elyar Afshari (; born 15 July 1995), known mononymously as Elyar (previously Elyar Fox) is a British-Azerbaijani pop singer. His debut single " Do It All Over Again" was released in January 2014, peaking at number 5 in the UK Singles Chart.

Early life

Elyar Afshari was born in

Ealing Ealing () is a district in west London (sub-region), west London, England, west of Charing Cross in the London Borough of Ealing. It is the administrative centre of the borough and is identified as a major metropolitan centre in the London Pl ...

, London, to an English mother and an Azerbaijani father. He was brought up in Greenford, London, and was educated at Costons Primary School and

Queensmead School Queensmead School is a co-educational secondary school with Academy (English school), academy status located on Queens Walk, South Ruislip, in the London Borough of Hillingdon, England. In 2009, Queensmead established a federation with Northwood ...

. He has one older brother named Iden.

Career

2005–2011: Early beginnings

"In 2005 I got a guitar and I started to just play, and then I started to write songs," Afshari stated in an interview regarding the beginning of his career. Whilst still at school he fronted the band 'Just Me Again', and performed for the first time at The Garage in Islington in 2009. After completing his

GCSEs The General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) is an academic qualification in a range of subjects taken in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, having been introduced in September 1986 and its first exams taken in 1988. State schools ...

, Afshari and his bandmates took a year off studies to focus on music. They supported You Me at Six on their British tour, including a performance at

The O2 Arena The O2 Arena, commonly known as The O2, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in the centre of The O2 entertainment district on the Greenwich Peninsula in southeast London, England. It opened in its present form in 2007. It has the third-highest seat ...

2012–present: Debut album / Debut EP

At the age of 16 he decided to go solo, and changed his name to Elyar Fox. He began posting videos of song covers to

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

under the name ''eldoode'', generating attention from people including

Ryan Seacrest Ryan John Seacrest (born December 24, 1974) is an American television presenter and producer. Seacrest is the host of '' Wheel of Fortune'', having hosted since replacing long-time host Pat Sajak in September 2024. Seacrest co-hosted and ser ...

. With the addition of his

Vevo Vevo LLC ( , an abbreviation for "Video Evolution", stylized in all caps until 2013) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational video hosting service, best known for providing music videos to YouTube. The service is also available ...

channel, Fox has gained over 27 million views (as of October 2014). In 2012 he signed with

Polydor Polydor Limited, also known as Polydor Records, is a British record label that operates as part of Universal Music Group. It has a close relationship with Universal's Interscope Geffen A&M Records label, which distributes Polydor's releases in ...

. He spent a year in the studio, but as Polydor were not interested in releasing, he left them and soon after was signed by

RCA RCA Corporation was a major American electronics company, which was founded in 1919 as the Radio Corporation of America. It was initially a patent pool, patent trust owned by General Electric (GE), Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Westinghou ...

. On 28 October 2013, Fox supported boy band

Union J Union J were an English boy band, consisting of members JJ Hamblett, Jaymi Hensley, George Shelley and Josh Cuthbert. Shelley left the group in 2016 and was replaced by Casey Johnson, who left several months later, Cuthbert left the grou ...

at a free gig in London's Westfield shopping centre. He went on to support Union J on their tour from December 2013 to January 2014. Fox came second in

MTV MTV (an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable television television channel, channel and the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group sub-division of the Paramount Media Networks division of Paramount Global. Launched on ...

's Brand New for 2014, having performed at the launch at London's Drury Club. Capital FM previewed his debut single, " Do It All Over Again", in November 2013, and premiered the single's official video in December. Fox was a surprise guest at the

Jingle Bell Ball The Jingle Bell Ball is a concert held annually in December since 2008 (except for 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic), by the radio station Capital (radio network), Capital FM at The O2 Arena. Various notable artists have headlined the con ...

in December 2013 where he performed his debut single in front of 16,000 people. On 12 January 2014, the official release date for "Do It All Over Again", Fox was a guest on ''The Matt Edmondson Show'' on

BBC Radio 1 BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It specialises in modern popular music and Contemporary hit radio, current chart hits throughout the day. The station provides alternative genres at night, including ...

. He performed a live acoustic version of "Do It All Over Again" on

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

's ''

Blue Peter ''Blue Peter'' is a British children's television entertainment programme created by John Hunter Blair. It is the longest-running children's TV show in the world, having been broadcast since October 1958. It was broadcast primarily from BBC ...

'' on 16 January 2014, and a recorded duet with presenter

Barney Harwood Barnaby John Harwood (born 7 November 1979) is a British actor and television presenter. He is known for his work with CBBC beginning in 2002. Career Television For CBBC, Harwood presented '' Prank Patrol'' and was a voice-over commentator for ...

singing

One Direction One Direction, often shortened to 1D, were an English-Irish pop boy band formed in London in 2010. The group consisted of Niall Horan, Zayn Malik (until his departure in 2015), Liam Payne, Harry Styles, and Louis Tomlinson. The group sold o ...

's " Story of My Life." Fox performed "Do It All Over Again" live on

CBBC CBBC is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the brand used for all BBC content for children aged 6 to 12. Its sister c ...

's ''Sam & Mark's Big Friday Wind-Up'' on 24 January 2014. The song peaked at number five on the UK Singles Chart and number 83 on the

Irish Singles Chart The Irish Singles Chart is the Republic of Ireland's music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by the Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA) and compiled on their behalf by the Official Charts Company. Chart rankings are ...

. Fox's second single, "A Billion Girls", was announced on 14 February 2014. Released on 13 April 2014, it was first played on Capital FM on 20 February 2014. A lyric video was released on Vevo on 7 March 2014, followed on the same channel by the full video on 25 March 2014. Fox was the opening support act for

The Wanted The Wanted are a British-Irish boy band formed in 2009, and originally consisted of members Max George, Siva Kaneswaran, Jay McGuiness, Tom Parker, and Nathan Sykes. The group signed a worldwide contract to Universal Music, Island Reco ...

on their

Word of Mouth Tour The Word of Mouth World Tour is the debut world tour by British-Irish boy band The Wanted. The tour is named after their third studio album ''Word of Mouth'' (2013). The band performed a total of 40 shows across Asia, Europe and North America. ...

from 1 March to 14 April 2014. He was a supporting act for

McBusted McBusted were an English pop-punk Supergroup (music), supergroup composed of members from bands McFly (Tom Fletcher, Danny Jones, Dougie Poynter, and Harry Judd) and Busted (band), Busted (James Bourne and Matt Willis). The only member of the o ...

at an open-air concert in

Hyde Park, London Hyde Park is a , historic Listed building#Heritage protection, Grade I-listed urban park in Westminster, Greater London. A Royal Parks of London, Royal Park, it is the largest of the parks and green spaces that form a chain from Kensington P ...

on 6 July 2014. In March 2017, he returned from his long hiatus, having shortened his name to 'Elyar', and released a new single called "Beautiful Human" on

Apple Music Apple Music is an audio and video streaming service developed by Apple Inc. Users can select music to stream to their device on-demand, or listen to existing playlists. The service also includes the sister internet radio stations Apple Musi ...

Soundcloud SoundCloud is a German audio streaming service owned and operated by SoundCloud Global Limited & Co. KG. The service enables its users to upload, promote, and share audio. Founded in 2007 by Alexander Ljung and Eric Wahlforss, SoundCloud is ...

and

. He explained on

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

that he had taken a long break to look for the sound that would suit him, but in order to do that he had to be independent, so he had left his management and label and started producing music from scratch in a studio built by him and his brother in their garden. In April 2017, Elyar released his first independent debut EP called "SVFARI". This EP contains 4 songs along with his previously released song, "Beautiful Human".

Personal life

Elyar has been in a relationship with fellow singer-songwriter

Leadley Bethan Mary Leadley (born 15 December 1995) is an English singer-songwriter, YouTuber, presenter, and actress. Early life and education Leadley was born in Crawley, West Sussex. She has an older brother, Daniel, who is married to Hannah Witton. ...

since February 2017.

Discography

Extended plays

* ''The 'Good Friends' Acoustic'' (2014) * ''SVFARI'' (2017) * ''Sappy'' (2018)

Singles

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Elyar Wikipedia articles in need of updating from August 2019 1995 births Living people People from Ealing Singers from the London Borough of Ealing English people of Azerbaijani descent 21st-century English singers English male singer-songwriters English singer-songwriters English pop singers 21st-century British male singers People from Greenford