Billy Joe Crawford (born May 16, 1982) is a Filipino-American recording artist, singer-songwriter and philanthropist.

Crawford is multilingual, being fluent in two Philippine languages, his native Tagalog as well as Cebuano. His second language is English and he is conversational in French. Crawford not only lived in New York City, USA, but also in Paris for five years and for one year in London. He currently resides in Los Angeles as of 2007. In 2008, he went to Manila to host Pinoy Dream Academy's uberture. He has also hosted the prestigious Miss Earth 2008 held in the Philippines.

He is now a talent of ABS-CBN and was seen in Pilipinas Got Talent as one of the two main hosts together with Luis Manzano.

Music career

Crawford had major chart success in France and other parts of Europe, but did not repeat this success in the United Kingdom and the United States, although his single "You Didn't Expect That" did make the lower reaches of the UK Top 40, peaking at number 35. He also contributed a remix of the Pokémon anime theme song for Pokémon: The First Movie in the series. Crawford also appeared at a popular Filipino American event called "Fiesta Filipina" in 2001 held in San Francisco, California, and American people have become more aware of his name.

Crawford's album Big City was released in 2004 in France and Asia only. The single "Bright Lights" was unable to break into the any Top 10 charts. The second single "Steamy Nights" produced by KOVAS - Ghetto Beat , fared better making Top 40, and was featured on 7 compilations across Europe and was the first single in Germany. Crawford's music video for "Steamy Nights" was shot in Los Angeles, California, and was produced with the same people who worked on the Destiny's Child single "Lose My Breath". Actress Jenna Dewan, who was one of the main characters in the popular 2006 film Step Up, was featured as Crawford's dance partner.

Another song from Candy Store was leaked from the album and received airplay on London radio. Thought to be a duet with Ginuwine, it is featured on the Big City album. After doing the first ever online reality show "the MSN Dance Show", his third single from Big City, "3 Wishes", was canceled by his label. Crawford felt it was time for something new and decided not to re-sign his contract with V2 records. He is writing and producing songs for other artists.

In 2006, Crawford began recording a new album which was expected to be released in 2007. In 2006, he toured during the summer with the L5 in France and in November he was scheduled to return to his home country to shoot a film.

In 2007, he returned to the Philippines for a new dance reality show M.O.V.E for GMA Network. The show searched for six back-up dancers for his Araneta Coliseum concert. After the successful concert, he returned to the United States to work on projects and fulfill several commitments.

In 2008, upon his return to the Philippines, Crawford decided to sign with ABS-CBN as an exclusive artist instead of returning to GMA. He became a regular on the Sunday variety show ASAP and later hosted the 2nd season of "Pinoy Dream Academy", a reality search that involves the skill of singing.

In 2009, Billy returns to acting via Your Song Presents with his partner and fellow singer Nikki Gil.

In 2010, he also hosted Pilipinas Got Talent with his fellow co-host Luis Manzano and both of them won as Best Talent Search Program Hosts in the recent 24th PMPC Star Awards for TV.

  Personal life

Crawford did not receive significant media attention after the Big City Tour 2005, mostly being mentioned in a few magazines for his break-up with Lorie, and began a new relationship with Marie Courchinoux (also known as Maryss from Paris) There is a recent interviews of Maryss that she was married to Billy Crawford for 5yrs and half and they got officially divorced last June 2010, a French dancer and member of the Beat Freaks whom he met when she auditioned for the Big City tour. Crawford also dated Mandy Moore for almost a year.

Crawford completed in 2008 his studio engineering course at New York University in New York, United States, and he will plan on getting the diploma