Leo Sayer who was born Gerard Hugh Sayer, 21 May 1948) is a British-born singer-songwriter musician and entertainer whose singing career has spanned four decades. He is now an Australian citizen and resident.
Sayer launched his career in the United Kingdom in the early 1970s, and became a top singles and album act on both sides of the Atlantic in the 1970s. His first seven hit singles in the United Kingdom all reached the Top 10
In January 1967, while 18-year-old Sayer was working as a hall porter at the King’s Hotel in Hove, he assisted in the rescue of guests from a fire that damaged the first floor of the hotel. He was rescued by builders working on a block of flats beside the hotel.In 2009, Sayer became an Australian citizen at the Australia Day Citizenship Ceremony in Canberra. Sayer has been diagnosed with Irritable bowel syndrome, and underwent colonoscopy in 2013, after having suffered stomach and bowel problems for an extended period of time. The examination revealed the edge of a tumour, which was excised following a two-and-a-half-hour surgery. The doctor had identified two ulcers in the singer’s intestine, one of which had become cancerous.
The doctor explained that had Sayer waited any longer, the cancer would have posed a serious danger. Sayer has, since the procedure, changed his dietary lifestyle and avoids alcohol, caffeine and foods containing spicy ingredients—another reason being that both his parents had died of cancer, his mother of bowel cancer and his father of lung cancer.
