Sade Adu (born Helen Folasade Adu) is a Nigerian-born British singer-songwriter, composer, and record producer. A contralto vocal range singer, she is the most successful solo female artist in British history, having sold over 110 million copies of her eleven albums worldwide.

Sade was born in Ibadan, Oyo State on January 16, 1959. Her father, Adebisi Adu, who hailed from Ikere Ekiti, was an economics lecturer and her mother, Anne Hayes, was an English district nurse. The couple met in London while her father was studying at the LondonLondon School of Economics (LSE – now the London School of Economics and Political Science). They married in 1955 and moved to Nigeria shortly afterward. When their daughter was born, no one was prepared to call her by her English name and a shortened version of Folasade (’Sade’) stuck. When she was four, her parents separated and her mother brought her and her elder brother Banji back to England where they initially lived with their grandparents in Colchester, Essex.

When Sade was 11, she moved to Holland-on-Sea to live with her mother. After completing school at 18, she moved to London and studied fashion at the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. While in college, she joined a North London Latin funk-soul band called Pride in which she sang backing vocals. She had initially failed her audition but was later invited when the members found that they had no other candidate who was more qualified. Her solo performances of the song "Smooth Operator" attracted the attention of record companies and in 1983, she signed a solo deal with Epic Records with three members of the band (Stuart Matthewman, Andrew Hale, and Paul Denman) to form the Sade band (which is named after her). Their debut album Diamond Life was released in 1984.