I love Lady Gaga.
She's good, her album topped the US Charts and sold more than one million copies in its first week. 
That is not surprising at all.
No it's not, and she studied at CAP21 but ended up dropping out to become a professional musician?
That was obviously a good decision on her part.
Collaborative Arts Project 21 (CAP21)
Collaborative Arts Project 21, known more commonly as CAP21, is a New York City professional musical theatre training conservatory and Off-Broadway theatre company. It has a large faculty and student body. The conservatory has produced many Broadway performers, as well as actors in off-Broadway, regional, and international theatre, television, film, and other performance media. Until 2012, it was in partnership with the New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. In 2014, CAP21
US, and has sold more than 7 million worldwide. It produced five consecutive singles in the top five of the Adult Top 40 radio charts; three of these, "It's Not Over", "Home", and "Over You" have each sold over 1 or more million copies in the US.
The second album, "Leave This Town", reached No. 1 on its debut week and sold 269,000 units in its first week. It has since sold over a million copies in the US