Bruce Springsteen

Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen was born on September 23, 1949, at Monmouth Medical Center in Long Branch, New Jersey, to Adele Ann Springsteen, a legal secretary who served as the family's primary breadwinner, and Douglas Frederick Springsteen, who worked as a bus driver among other jobs. Springsteen is of Dutch, Irish, and Italian descent and was raised Catholic in Freehold, New Jersey. He has two younger sisters, Virginia, born in 1951, and Pamela, born around 1962, the latter of whom worked as an actress before becoming a photographer and shooting images for three of her brother's albums: Human Touch, Lucky Town, and The Ghost of Tom Joad.

Springsteen's interest in music began at age seven, sparked by Elvis Presley's appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1956 and 1957. His mother subsequently rented him a guitar from Mike Diehl's Music in Freehold for six dollars a week. He attended St. Rose of Lima Catholic School before enrolling at Freehold High School, where he graduated in 1967 without attending the ceremony. He briefly enrolled at Ocean County College before dropping out. At nineteen, he was called for a military draft physical but was deemed unacceptable for service, in part due to a concussion sustained in a motorcycle accident two years prior.

His performing career began in 1964, when he bought a guitar for $18.95 at the Western Auto appliance store after watching the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show. He played with a band called the Rogues at local venues including the Elks Lodge in Freehold. His mother later took out a loan to purchase him a $60 Kent guitar, an act he later referenced in his song "The Wish." In 1965, with the support of local band sponsors Tex and Marion Vinyard, Springsteen became lead guitarist and a lead singer of the Castiles, a band that recorded two original songs at a studio in Brick Township and performed at venues including Cafe Wha? in Greenwich Village. In the late 1960s, he performed with a power trio called Earth, which played clubs in New Jersey and appeared at the Hotel Diplomat in New York City. From 1969 through early 1971, he performed with a band called Child, which later became Steel Mill.

Springsteen released his first two albums, Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. and The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle, in 1973. The E Street Band, which has served as his backing band since 1972, appeared on most of his subsequent recordings. Worldwide recognition came with Born to Run in 1975, followed by Darkness on the Edge of Town in 1978 and The River in 1980, the first of his albums to reach the top of the Billboard 200. The solo acoustic album Nebraska appeared in 1982, and Born in the U.S.A., recorded with the E Street Band, followed in 1984 and became his most commercially successful release, ranking as the 23rd-best-selling album of all time as of 2024. For his next three studio albums — Tunnel of Love in 1987, Human Touch in 1992, and Lucky Town in 1992 — Springsteen worked primarily with session musicians rather than the E Street Band.

The E Street Band reunited for Greatest Hits in 1995, the same year Springsteen recorded the solo acoustic album The Ghost of Tom Joad. The EP Blood Brothers followed in 1996. After a reunion tour, he released The Rising in 2002, dedicated to the victims of the September 11 attacks. Two folk albums, Devils & Dust in 2005 and We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions in 2006, came next, the latter being his first cover album. He continued releasing studio work with Magic in 2007, Working on a Dream in 2009, Wrecking Ball in 2012, and High Hopes in 2014. The solo album Western Stars appeared in 2019, and Letter to You, recorded with the E Street Band, was released in 2020. With that album, Springsteen became the first artist to place a top-five album in six consecutive decades. A solo cover album, Only the Strong Survive, followed in 2022. Across his career, Springsteen has released 21 studio albums and sold more than 140 million records worldwide.

From 2017 to 2021, Springsteen appeared on Broadway in Springsteen on Broadway, a show in which he performed songs and told stories drawn from his 2016 autobiography. He also served as the production's book writer. The engagement earned him a Tony Award Special Award in 2018. Among his broader accolades are 20 Grammy Awards, two Golden Globes, and an Academy Award. He was inducted into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1999, received the Kennedy Center Honors in 2009, was named MusiCares Person of the Year in 2013, and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2016 and the National Medal of Arts in 2023. In 2010, Rolling Stone placed him 23rd on its list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2025, he became one of only five artists to gross over $2.3 billion in touring, a milestone reached through his 2023–2025 tour with the E Street Band.