International pop singing sensation Mika played to a sell-out crowd on Sunday when he staged his first concert in Beirut, the city of his birth.

“This is quite a proud moment for me,” Mika, 25, told reporters on Saturday. “This concert has been a long time coming, and finally it's taking place.”

He has tried before to bring what he calls his “travelling circus” to Lebanon, but had to cancel because of the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war and the political violence that has afflicted the country over the past two years.

More than 10,000 tickets were sold, and 15,000 people crowded into Martyrs' Square in the heart of Beirut for the open-air concert

Mika's mother is Lebanese, his father is American, and he speaks with a British accent. His family moved to Paris when he was very young and later to London, where he was raised.

“Anyone who is any part Lebanese will tell you the same thing that the Lebanese completely takes over” said Mika, who won the British Breakthrough Act award in the annual Brits music awards in London in February.

“I was always very proud of where I came from and who I am, and being Lebanese is a big part of that.”

Mika's concert was a highlight of Lebanon's music festival season during a summer that has also seen the start of a revival for the country's tourism industry, badly hit over the past two years.

The organizers of the Beiteddine and Baalbek festivals co-sponsored the concert by Mika, who shot to fame in 2007 with his first album of Freddie Mercury-style 80s pop.

-AFP