Shirlie Holliman

Shirlie Kemp (née Holliman; born 18 April 1962) is an English singer who found fame in the 1980s with Wham! and as part of the duo Pepsi & Shirlie along with Helen DeMacque.

Early years Shirley Holliman was the fourth child of five, born to Arthur and Margaret Holliman and raised on a council estate in Bushey, near Watford, Hertfordshire. Holliman intended to train as a horse riding instructor, but after she developed hay fever at the age of 18 and with nothing else to do, her then-boyfriend Andrew Ridgeley suggested she come and dance while he and his friend George Michael's band played a local gig.

On 29 November 2002, Holliman was a back-up vocalist in the Concert for George, a concert celebrating the music of the late George Harrison.

In November 2019, Holliman and her husband Martin Kemp released their first album together as Martin & Shirlie, titled In the Swing of It via Sony Music. The album contains duet covers of classic jazz standards plus two original songs written by their daughter Harley Moon Kemp.

In January 2023, Holliman appeared alongside her husband on the fourth series of The Masked Singer as "Cat & Mouse".

Personal life Holliman was in a relationship with Andrew Ridgeley, whom she described as very charismatic, for two years. Following their break up, George Michael encouraged her to telephone Spandau Ballet bassist and singer Martin Kemp, who had given her his number. Holliman and Kemp married in St. Lucia in 1988 and went on to have two children: daughter Harley Moon Kemp (born August 1989) and son Roman Kemp (born January 1993). She retired from steady performing after the birth of their daughter, though Holliman and daughter Harley had brief roles together in the music video for the Spice Girls' "Mama".

In 2021, Holliman appeared with her son in the documentary Roman Kemp: Our Silent Emergency in which Kemp revealed that he came close to attempting suicide after battling with depression for 13 years.

As Shirlie Kemp, she gave a personal account of the wild times touring with Wham! in the joint autobiography, Pepsi & Shirlie: It's All Black and White, written with her friend, Pepsi DeMacque-Crockett, and published by Welbeck in 2021.