Little-Known Facts About Young Justin: He Was Originally Discovered on YouTube by Scooter Braun Who Found His Videos
Long before he was selling out stadiums worldwide, dominating global music charts, and defining a generation of pop music, Justin Bieber was just a kid from Stratford, Ontario with a passion for singing.
As captured in the heartwarming childhood photo featured in, which shows a young, bowl-cut-rocking Justin with a bright smile, nobody could have predicted just how massive his trajectory would become. Here is a look back at the incredible, almost accidental way the young star was first discovered.
The Accidental Click That Changed Pop History
In 2007, a young Justin Bieber was entering local singing competitions and posting the recorded clips to YouTube so family members who lived far away could see them. He was singing covers of R&B hits by artists like Usher, Ne-Yo, and Chris Brown.
At the same time, talent manager Scooter Braun was looking for a completely different artist on YouTube when he accidentally clicked on one of Justin’s videos.
“I clicked on his video by accident, and I just knew there was something special there,” Braun later recounted in interviews.
Impressively, the video showed a raw, untrained 12-year-old singing with a soulful maturity that far exceeded his years. Braun was so determined to find the boy in the video that he began cold-calling schools in Stratford and contacting Justin’s mother, Pattie Mallette, until he finally secured a meeting.
