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For other people named Amy Lee, see Amy Lee (disambiguation).

Amy Lee

Amy Lee; born December 13, 1981), is an American singer-songwriter and classically-trained pianist. She is co-founder and lead vocalist of the alternative metal band Evanescence. Her influences range from classical musicians such as Mozart to modern artists like Björk, Tori Amos, Danny Elfman, and Plumb.

Biography

Early life

Amy Lee was born to parents John Lee, a disc jockey and TV personality, and Sara Cargill. She has one brother, Robby, and two sisters, Carrie and Lori. Lee had a third sister, who died in 1987 at the age of three from an unidentified illness. The song "Hello" from Fallen has been reported to have been written for her late sister, as well as the song "Like You" from The Open Door with the lyrics, "I long to be like you, sis; Lie cold in the ground like you did," also hinting at the death of her sister and her grief for it. Lee took classical piano lessons for nine years. Her family moved to many places, including Florida and Illinois, but eventually settled in Little Rock, Arkansas, where Evanescence started. She graduated from Pulaski Academy in 2000 and also briefly attended Middle Tennessee State University. Lee has stated that she is of mostly Scottish and English heritage.

In an interview on AOL Music, Lee revealed that the first songs she remembered writing were called "Eternity of the Remorse" and "A Single Tear". The first was written when she was eleven years old and wanted to become a classical composer, and the second was for an assignment when she was in the eighth grade.

Evanescence

Lee at the 2007 Scream Awards

Founding

She co-founded the band with Ben Moody. The two met at a youth camp after he heard Lee playing Meat Loaf's "I'd Do Anything for Love (But I Won't Do That)" on the piano. Within a month, the pair were playing acoustic sets at Arkansas book stores and coffee houses, and they eventually recorded two EPs, Evanescence EP (1998) and Sound Asleep EP (1999), selling them at various local venues. In 2000, Evanescence recorded the longer EP Origin. This demo contains three songs from the debut album Fallen and was written by Lee and Moody: "Whisper", "Imaginary" and "My Immortal". Whereas "Whisper" and "Imaginary" underwent further modifications before being included on Fallen, "My Immortal" is virtually identical. A later band version of "My Immortal" was made available for download for those who had bought an official version of Fallen through their official web site, but required that a CD checker program also be downloaded for verification before it would play. The band version was included on later copies of Fallen, notably the Brazilian, Bolivian, and Argentine editions.

Departure of Ben Moody

On October 22, 2003, guitarist Ben Moody left the band citing "creative differences". In an interview several months later, Amy said: "...we'd gotten to a point that if something didn't change, we wouldn't have been able to make a second record". She also said "We're finally a real band, not just Ben and I and a few others thrown together". Ex-Cold guitarist Terry Balsamo replaced Moody in the band, both on guitar and as Lee's writing partner.

Lawsuit

On December 1, 2005, former Evanescence manager Dennis Rider filed a US$10 million lawsuit against Lee for breach of contract. The suit claims Rider was prematurely and unjustly terminated from his position as manager of Evanescence, just one album into a three-record deal.

In return, Lee filed a counter-suit against Rider for "'breach of fiduciary duty,' sexual assault and battery, professional negligence and currency conversion, among other claims." The suit also claims Rider "neglected Lee's career and business and has focused his efforts on having extramarital affairs, hiding them from his wife, becoming intoxicated during business meetings, physically abusing women and boasting about it, making repeated unwelcome sexual advances toward Lee, receiving fees in excess of what was provided for in his management agreement and using Lee's corporate credit card to purchase gifts for his mistress."

Rider's attorney, Bert Deixler, claimed in a statement that since Rider became the group's manager in 2002, he had fully performed all of the duties and obligations owed by the firm under the management agreement, and that he had always conducted himself by the highest professional standards.

Engagement and marriage

Lee revealed during the taping of MuchMusic's January 9, 2007 episode of Live @ Much that she had become engaged the previous evening. She later confirmed on EvThreads.com that she had been proposed to by Josh Hartzler, a 29-year-old therapist and long-time friend. She noted in an interview that the songs "Good Enough" and "Bring Me To Life" were inspired by him. The couple were married on May 6, 2007, and honeymooned near The Bahamas. She has posted on EvThreads that she is "now officially Mrs. Amy Hartzler."

Lee performing at an Evanescence concert

Appearance

Lee has a recognizable fashion style, marked by her occasional use of Gothic make-up and taste for Victorian-styled clothing. She also designs many of her own clothes, including those worn in the music video for "Going Under", the dress she wore at the 2004 Grammy awards, and the dress worn for the cover of The Open Door. After she designed it she chose Japanese designer H. Naoto to make it for her. In concerts, she often wears a corset and fishnets, as well as long skirts and knee-high boots. She at one point had a piercing on her left eyebrow, which is visible on the cover of Fallen.

She has stated on a number of occasions that she would never flash her breasts or engage in other publicity stunts that would draw attention to herself. In fact, in the music video for "Everybody's Fool," she aimed to mock such artists by suggesting that celebrities who use sex to appeal to an audience are, in fact, merely peddling "lies" (the unifying theme of the music video). Many fans praise Lee for her refusal to emulate other celebrities by using sex appeal in her music.

In 2006, Blender listed Lee as one of the hottest women in rock alongside such singers as Joan Jett, Courtney Love and Liz Phair.

Lee at the 2003 Billboard Awards

Other projects

In 2000, Lee sang guest vocals on two of former Evanescence keyboardist David Hodges' songs: "Breathe" (The Summit Church: Summit Worship) and the unreleased "Fall Into You". She performed backup vocals for "Missing You", a song on Big Dismal's 2003 debut album Believe, and sang backup vocals on two songs with 'supergroup' The Damning Well, though her vocals were taken off the final release due to record label issues. Lee later performed a duet with her then-boyfriend Shaun Morgan on the track "Broken" for Seether's 2004 album Disclaimer II. The song was also featured as part of the soundtrack for the 2004 film The Punisher.

In 2004, Lee claimed to be working on music for The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, but that the music was rejected by the studio for being "too dark and epic." However, the producers of Narnia stated that Lee was never asked to compose any music for the film, whose score was written by Harry Gregson-Williams, and that "No Evanescence music was planned for the soundtrack." While there was some speculation that one of the supposed songs had been cut and used in several tracks of The Open Door, Lee stated this was not true except for part of it being used to segue into the last track of the album, "Good Enough".

Lee became the American Chairperson for Out of the Shadows in 2006. This organization is an international foundation with the goal of providing education about epilepsy. Lee's younger brother, Robby, was previously diagnosed with this condition. The singer also made a brief guest appearance in the music video for Johnny Cash's "God's Gonna Cut You Down" in late 2006. As each celebrity featured in the shoot was allowed to choose what they would be doing for the video, Lee chose to appear laying flowers on a grave. Her scene was recorded at Trinity Church in Manhattan, during which she wore a black velvet coat that previously belonged to Tim Burton.

In February 2007, MTV released MTV Unplugged: Korn to television and radio, in which Lee is featured during the song "Freak on a Leash". The song was also released as the first single from the album. In November 2007, VH1 produced a mockumentary in the style of Behind the Music, titled Rock Band Cometh: The Rock Band Band Story, to promote the video game Rock Band. Lee was one of the celebrity cameos featured on the show.

For Walt Disney Records' September 2008 release of Nightmare Revisited, Lee sang a remake of "Sally's Song". The album is comprised of new material and covers of songs from the original Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack. Lee will also perform live renditions of "Sally's Song" during the the Nightmare Before Christmas re-release premiere in Hollywood, California, and for an appearance on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.

Discography

Evanescence albums

Main article: Evanescence discography

• Evanescence EP (December, 1998)
• Sound Asleep EP (August, 1999)
• Origin (November 4, 2000)
• Mystary EP (January, 2003)
• Fallen (March 4, 2003)
• Anywhere but Home (November 23, 2004)
• The Open Door (October 3, 2006)

Collaborations

• David Hodges featuring Amy Lee - "Breathe" - The Summit Church: Summit Worship (2000)
• David Hodges featuring Amy Lee - "Fall Into You" (2000, Unreleased)
• Big Dismal featuring Amy Lee - "Missing You" - Believe (2003)
• Seether featuring Amy Lee - "Broken" - Disclaimer II (2004) and The Punisher: The Album (2004)
• Korn featuring Amy Lee - "Freak on a Leash" - MTV Unplugged: Korn (2007)

Other

• "Sally's Song" - Nightmare Revisited (2008)

External links

• Evanescence.com - Official U.S. website
• Out of the Shadows - The Amy Lee Fund for Epilepsy