In January 2007, Justin Bieber’s mom, Pattie Mallette, posted a video of her son, then 12, covering R&B star Ne-Yo’s “So Sick” at a kids’ singing competition in a little town near Toronto.
“I told him, ‘Okay, you’ve never sung in front of anybody before, and you’ve never had singing lessons,’” Mallette told me. ‘Let’s adjust our expectations.’ ” Bieber …

