She may be best known as the goddaughter of Amy Winehouse, but Dionne Bromfield is making her own mark on the music industry. Aged just 17, the singer already has two albums under her belt and a MOBO award nomination. This week she will be headlining a one-off concert at Whitstable Castle. What’s On caught up with her.

When Dionne Bromfield first started out in the music business she had a definite advantage over other aspiring talents. A superstar godmother called Amy Winehouse.

And it was in fact Amy who first encouraged the shy teenager to consider a career as a musician.

Dionne, 17, who grew up in Chislehurst, Kent, said: “Everyone told me I could sing from about the age of 10. My mum was always telling me. But I was so shy I didn’t believe them. And the more that people told me, the more I went into the background and the less likely I was to sing.

“But I was at home once and Amy was round and heard me and she said ‘girl, it’s true. You can.’ And that started something off in me. I started getting just that bit more confident.”

Dionne followed in her godmother’s footsteps, attending the Sylvia Young Theatre School and learning guitar.

-Born in London’s Tower Hamlets, Dionne grew up in Chislehurst, Kent

-Dionne’s mum Julie chose the late singer Amy Winehouse to be her godmother, as the pair had been friends for years

-She has been the face of Gio-Goi fashion since 2011 and has just started promoting a range of Kiss false eyelashes and nail products

But such was Dionne’s reluctance to enter the limelight, she didn’t tell any of her friends that she was recording her first album, Introducing Dionne Bromfield, a collection of soul covers released in 2009. “I thought they’d think I was up myself if I told them,” she said.

Most people didn’t even know she was a recording artist until they saw her talking about the album, aged just 13, on ITV’s This Morning sofa.

Amy played a huge part in promoting Dionne’s music, joining her on stage at gigs and even providing backing vocals when Dionne sang Mama Said on BBC show Strictly Come Dancing.

Dionne also signed to Amy’s Lioness label, which released her second album, Good For The Soul, in July 2011, featuring original self-penned songs.

But she admits that her writing process began tentatively.

She said: “The first time I was left in the studio with a piece of music to write on my own? I mean, oh my god! All these thoughts go through your head but the first one is what if no one likes it? You have to just remember that even when I’m working with lots of amazing people, they all started where I started. Plus I’m much younger than them, so they can see that I might be intimidated.”

Eventually she began to see her youthful approach as a good thing. She said: “When you’re working with people that are much older, you get two different sides of a story. You’ll get the kids’ perspective and the adults’ perspective.”

After spending a few weeks in LA, she decamped to London where she found her ‘sound’ with former Incognito henchman John Paul ‘Bluey’ Maunick and sometime Duffy collaborator Paul O’Duffy.

“I walked into the studio with Paul and he had an idea for a song. I didn’t like it and I couldn’t think of a way to tell him. I mean, how do I, then a 14-year-old girl, tell this grown man that I don’t like his idea?

"We worked on that idea for a bit and while we were doing it something else clicked into my head which became The Sweetest Thing. I started thinking about a boy in my school, the year above me. My friend really liked him. She just wanted him to notice her. And she’d always say ‘I just want him to look my way’. And as soon as I remembered her saying that the first line of the song was done.”

The Sweetest Thing was included on her second album, which again had a heavy soul vibe, influenced by Dionne’s love of the genre, particularly Motown.

She said: “You don’t get artists like Marvin Gaye and the Temptations anymore. But it was as natural for me to sing along to those artists when I was growing up as it was for my friends to with Britney or the Sugababes.”

But there are bittersweet memories connected with the album, as just a couple of weeks after its release in July 2011, Amy died at her home in Camden.

In October that year, Dionne performed Amy’s song Love Is A Losing Game as part of a tribute at the Mobo awards ceremony, where she had been nominated for Best R‘n’B/Soul Act.

And Dionne has continued to work hard since then to further the career which Amy helped start.

Amy’s funeral even proved a source of inspiration for Dionne’s latest song.

She said: “The song is called Black Butterfly. There was a black butterfly that flew in at Amy’s funeral and it landed on Kelly Osbourne’s shoulder. It stayed there for the whole service then flew out as soon as the service had finished. It’s probably the best song I’ve ever written.”

One Summer Night With Dionne Bromfield takes place at Whitstable Castle on Friday, August 30. Also on the line-up are classical soprano Natalie Coyle and jazz singer Xara Vaughan. The audience will be greeted by a string quartet as they arrive.

Tickets for the show, which will take place in the castle gardens, start at £25. Doors open at 7pm. Visit englisheventscompany.com or call 01227 281726.