Tone Damli Aaberge (born April 12, 1988, in Sogndal, Norway) is a Norwegian singer. She became a star overnight after participating in the Norwegian version of Idol in 2005. In 2009, when she started pursuing an international career, she changed her name to Tone Damli, since “Aaberge” is too hard to pronounce.
Tone started singing in a local choir when she was 4-5 years old. She knew early on she wanted to be a singer. She took singing lessons and she has also played in a band. Her influences come from “grown up” artists, like Jeff Buckley and Radka Toneff.
She was the runner-up in the Norwegian Idol song contest, losing to Jorun Stiansen in the final. The finale was the most watched televised entertainment event in the history of the TV2 broadcasting house, with 1,4 million viewers.
Even though she came in second, she is one of the only Idol participants that has actually gone on to have a singing career. The only one that’s been more successful than her is the original winner, Kurt Nilsen.
She has released 4 studio albums;“Bliss”, “Sweet Fever”, “I Know” and “Cocool”, and also the greatest hits compilation “Looking Back”. She took part in the Melodi Grand Prix, Norwegian pre-selection for the Eurovision Song Contest, in 2009, with the song “Butterflies”, and ended up as the runner-up yet again.
Her song was on the Norwegian Top 20 list (VG-lista) for 16 weeks. She also took part in the second season of the Norwegian version of Dancing with the Stars, in 2006, where she finished third. In 2013, she entered the Swedish pre-selections for ESC, Melodifestivalen, with the duet “Hello Goodbye” featuring Erik Segerstedt, ending up not making the finals.
At the end of 2012, she started releasing singles from an upcoming fifth studio album, starting with Smash. This time, she worked with different producers for a more synthesized pop sound than her usual material.
The next single, Winner of a Losing Game, produced by Stargate, was released on June 21st. The EP also included the Darkchild-produced “Perfect World” and “Hello Goodbye”. The EP was released on January 20th, along with a final song, ‘Heartkill’.
