Amy Lynn Hartzler (née Lee; born December 13, 1981), known professionally as Amy Lee, is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. She is the co-founder and lead vocalist of the rock band Evanescence. Along with her contributions with the band, Lee has also participated on other musical projects including Walt Disney Records' Nightmare Revisited and Muppets: The Green Album. She has performed collaborations with artists such as Korn, Seether, and David Hodges. Lee composed the soundtrack to the films War Story (2014) and Indigo Grey: The Passage(2015) with cellist Dave Eggar, and the song "Speak to Me" for the film Voice from the Stone (2017). She possesses a mezzo-soprano vocal range. Lee received the Songwriter Icon Award from the National Music Publishers Association in 2008. In 2012, she won Best Vocalist at the Revolver Golden Gods Awards and was also named Rock Goddess of the Year at the Loudwire Music Awards. She was awarded Best Film Score by the Moondance International Film Festival for Indigo Grey: The Passage in 2015. Lee is also the American chairperson for the international epilepsy awareness foundation Out of the Shadows. Amy Lee was born in Riverside, California, to parents John Lee, a disc jockey and TV personality, and Sara Cargill. She has two sisters, Carrie and Lori. Lee had a younger sister who died in 1987 at the age of three from an unidentified illness and a brother named Robby who died in 2018 from unknown causes.The song "Hello" from Fallenhas been reported to have been written for her late sister, as well as the song "Like You" from The Open Door. Lee took classical piano lessons for nine years.
Lee's family moved to many places, including West Palm Beach, Florida, and Rockford, Illinois, and eventually settled in Little Rock, Arkansas, where Evanescence was formed. Lee graduated from Pulaski Academy, a private school in Little Rock, in 2000. She briefly attended Middle Tennessee State University in 2000 to study music theory and composition but dropped out to focus on Evanescence.
In an interview on AOL Music, Lee said 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.
