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Amy Lynn Hartzler (born and best known
as Amy Lynn Lee, December 13, 1981 in Riverside,
California) is an American singer-songwriter and
classically-trained pianist. She is a founding member
and lead singer of the Grammy Award winning rock band
Evanescence. Her influences range from classical
musicians such as Mozart to modern artists like Björk,
Tori Amos, Danny Elfman and Plumb.
Early life: 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 finally settled in Little
Rock, Arkansas, where Evanescence started. She graduated
from Pulaski Academy in 2000 and also briefly attended
Middle Tennessee State University.
Evanescence: She founded the band with Ben Moody.
The two met at a youth camp when Lee was 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 before recording two EPs, Evanescence EP (in
1998) and then the Sound Asleep EP (in 1999). Another
song, "You", was written by Amy Lee but was
never intended to be released. Rumors, though
unsubstantiated, circulated that when "You"
was leaked, she asked people to stop distributing the
song and its lyrics.
Many, but not all, lyrics websites complied with her
wishes. 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 versions of Fallen,
notably the Brazilian 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 lawsuit against Lee for
breach of contract. The suit claims Rider was
prematurely and unjustly terminated from his position as
manager of Evanescence.
In return, Lee filed a counter-suit against Rider for
"breach of fiduciary duty, sexual assault and
battery, professional negligence, currency conversion,
and other charges". 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 Rider 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.
The Open Door: Lee was working on the opening
theme of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch
and the Wardrobe and writing additional music for the
film, but the music was rejected for being "too
dark and epic". However, Lee has been quoted as
saying that the rejected material is "just more
great stuff for the new album".
There was some speculation that the song had been cut
and used in several tracks though Lee has stated that
this is not true. Lee has stated that the song was used
to segue into the last track on the album, "Good
Enough".
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 was
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."
Image: Lee has a recognizable neo-goth 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" and the dress she wore at
the 2004 Grammy awards. 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 used to have a
notable 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 Magazine listed her as one of the
hottest women in rock along side such singers as Joan
Jett, Courtney Love and Liz Phair.
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
ex-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.
2006 has seen Lee become the American Chairperson for
Out of the Shadows, an international foundation with the
goal of educating others about epilepsy. Lee's younger
brother, Robbie, 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".
On Korn's last release MTV Unplugged: Korn, Lee was
featured in the song "Freak on a Leash". The
song is also the first single from the album and was
released to television and radio in early February 2007. |
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